The Study of Immobilized Media and Ni Ion Addition Effects on COD Removal of POME Using Anaerobic Filter Reactor

Abstract: Palm oil mill effluent (POME) liquid waste contains high organic compounds. It has a high potential to be processed into biogas. One of the technologies that has been developed in processing POME is Fixed Film Bioreactor or anaerobic filter reactor (AFR). AFR is able to handle waste with high organic loading rate by using bacterial attached growth solid media on the surface of the media to form biofilm, which creates an optimum environment to microorganism growth and metabolism. Plastic balls (bio-balls) is one of the potential immobilization media due to chemically inert and lightweight. In addition, trace elements may enhance methanogens activities. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of bioball as an immobilization media and the addition of trace element Ni to anaerobic digestion process with POME substrate in terms of decreasing soluble chemical oxigen demand (sCOD) and methane production on fixed bed reactor in batch and continuous mode in sequence. The best performance of the reactor was able to reduce 92 of COD content inside the pome by 5 L/day of loading rate of 24,000 ppm POME. Graphic Abstract: Figure not available: see fulltext.. © 2020, Springer Nature B.V.