Preliminary Studies on Oleochemical Wastewater Treatment using Submerged Bed Biofilm Reactor (SBBR)

Abstract

Wastewater discharge from the industry into water sources is one of the main reason for water pollution. The oleochemicals industry effluent produces high content of chemical oxygen demand (COD) with value between 6000-20,000 ppm. Effective treatment is required before wastewater effluent is discharged to environment. The aim of the study is to develop submerged bed biofilm reactor (SBBR) with packing materials in the cosmoball® carrier. Water quality such as chemical oxygen demands (COD), turbidity and pH were analysed. The result shows that the initial COD of 6000 ppm was reduced below 200 ppm. The optimum conditions for SBBR were obtained when green sponges used as packing material in cosmoball® effluent flowrate set at 100 mL/min; 1:1 ratio of cosmoball® volume to reactor volume and 1:1 ratio of active sludge (mixed culture) volume to reactor volume. Turbidity and pH were recorded with 9.0 NTU and 7.0 respectively, which indicated that SBBR is feasible as an alternative for conventional biological treatment in oleochemical industry.