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. 2021 May 8;11(5):345.
doi: 10.3390/membranes11050345.

Treatment of Poultry Slaughterhouse Wastewater (PSW) Using a Pretreatment Stage, an Expanded Granular Sludge Bed Reactor (EGSB), and a Membrane Bioreactor (MBR)

Honeil Basile Meyo  1 , Mahomet Njoya  1 , Moses Basitere  2 , Seteno Karabo Obed Ntwampe  3 , Ephraim Kaskote  4
Affiliations

Treatment of Poultry Slaughterhouse Wastewater (PSW) Using a Pretreatment Stage, an Expanded Granular Sludge Bed Reactor (EGSB), and a Membrane Bioreactor (MBR)

Honeil Basile Meyo et al. Membranes (Basel). .

Abstract

This study presents the biological treatment of poultry slaughterhouse wastewater (PSW) using a combination of a biological pretreatment stage, an expanded granular sludge bed reactor (EGSB), and a membrane bioreactor (MBR) to treat PSW. This PSW treatment was geared toward reducing the concentration of contaminants present in the PSW to meet the City of Cape Town (CoCT) discharge standards and evaluate an alternative means of treating medium- to high-strength wastewater at low cost. The EGSB used in this study was operated under mesophilic conditions and at an organic loading rate (OLR) of 69 to 456 mg COD/L·h. The pretreatment stage of this laboratory-scale (lab-scale) plant played an important role in the pretreatment of the PSW, with removal percentages varying between 20% and 50% for total suspended solids (TSS), 20% and 70% for chemical oxygen demand (COD), and 50% and 83% for fats, oil, and grease (FOG). The EGSB further reduced the concentration of these contaminants to between 25% and 90% for TSS, 20% and 80% for COD, and 20% and >95% for FOG. The last stage of this process, i.e., the membrane bioreactor (MBR), contributed to a further decrease in the concentration of these contaminants with a peak removal performance of >95% for TSS and COD and 80% for the FOG. Overall, the system (pretreatment-EGSB-MBR) exceeded 97% for TSS and COD removal and 97.5% for FOG removal. These results culminated in a product (treated wastewater) meeting the discharge standards.

Keywords: chemical oxygen demand (COD); expanded granular sludge bed reactor (EGSB); fats, oil, and grease (FOG); membrane bioreactor (MBR); poultry slaughterhouse wastewater (PSW); total suspended solids (TSS).

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Poultry slaughterhouse wastewater (PSW) miniaturized lab-scale plant setup.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic representation of the EGSB used.
Figure 3
Figure 3
The MBR unit used.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Schematic representation of the MBR unit used.
Figure 5
Figure 5
The MBR unit with a membrane compartment and an SNaD during inoculation.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Pretreatment stage performance determined using COD, TSS, and FOG removal.
Figure 7
Figure 7
Boxplots of the distributions of TSS, FOD, and COD before and after outlier replacement.
Figure 8
Figure 8
Pretreatment stage performance assessed using COD, TSS, and FOG concentration removal.
Figure 9
Figure 9
EGSB performance with respect to COD, TSS, and FOG removal.
Figure 10
Figure 10
Boxplot of the EGSB parameters.
Figure 11
Figure 11
Variation in FOG removal with differentiated OLR during the EGSB operational time.
Figure 12
Figure 12
Variation in COD removal with differentiated OLR during the EGSB operational time.
Figure 13
Figure 13
Variation in TSS removal with differentiated OLR during the EGSB operational time.
Figure 14
Figure 14
MBR performance with respect to COD, TSS, and FOG removal.
Figure 15
Figure 15
Boxplot of the MBR performance with regard to quantified quality parameters.
Figure 16
Figure 16
Variation in FOG removal with varying OLR during the operation of the MBR.
Figure 17
Figure 17
Variation in COD removal with varying OLR during the operation of the MBR.
Figure 18
Figure 18
Variation in TSS removal with varying OLR during the operation of the MBR.
Figure 19
Figure 19
Overall performance of the pretreatment–EGSB–MBR system with respect to COD, TSS, and FOG removal.
Figure 20
Figure 20
Boxplots of the parameters for the overall process.
Figure 21
Figure 21
3D plot of the overall performance (COD VS FOG).
Figure 22
Figure 22
3D plot of the overall performance (COD VS TSS).
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