Investigation of Surfactant Removal Using Moving Bed Biofilm Reactor (MBBR)

Document Type : Original Articles

Authors

Department of Environmental Management, Faculty of Engineering, Tarbiat Moddares University

Abstract

Moving Bed Biofilm Reactor has been taken less attention in treatment of surfactants. In this research with consideration of its advantages and suitable efficiency in industrial wastewater treatment, three 5L-reactors at different retention times were used to investigate the removal efficiency of sodium dodecyle benezene sulfonate (SDBS), sodium dodecyle sulfate (SDS) and cetyl trimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB). The results indicated that the best removal efficiency in batch loadingsystem with filling ratio of 50% of the reactor volume by LECA (Light Expanded Clay Aggregate) was 90, 95, and 93 percent for SDBS (COD=900 mg/l),SDS (COD=1200 mg/l)and CTAB (COD=1200 mg/l), respectively. NMR test results confirmed biodegradation ability of compounds in MBBR. In the study of filling ratio effect in the reactors, the volumes of the carriers were decreased to 30% and the removal efficiency were improved by 2% for SDBS and CTAB systems but no change was observed for SDS system. In the study of temperature effect no considerable change has been observed in the removal efficiency. Finally, biological modeling of the reactors using Stover-Kinkannon, first order and Grau models have shown that the reactors followed both Stover-Kinkannon and Grau ones.

Keywords