Polishing of Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) Using Moving Bed Bio-Reactor

Abstract

The pilot-scale experiment in moving bed biofilm reactor (MBBR) with a capacity of 433 L was carried out for this study with real life situations, it was decided that the complete research work must be done under as realistic conditions as possible,i.e.with real municipal wastewater, chemical free and with local commercially available products such as carriers for biofilm reactor. The reactor was start-up in 30/9/2013 up to date, Effluent from clarifier of STP used as influence of MBBR for polishing. MBBR is using continues down flow to polish effluent municipal wastewater from a faculty of new building engineering community in UKM to get the water free from main pollutant parameters, for reuse in the irrigation or discharge to the river. Laboratory experiments will conduct with different hydraulic retention time (HRT), filling ratio of plastic (Enviro Multi Media) in the MBBR about 5%. Aerobic reactors used the majority of the decaying organic material. An average removal rate of 41.75%, 32.85%, 24.80% and 35.77% of initial chemical oxygen demand (COD) were achieved under a HRT of 24hr, 12hr, 6hr and 2hr, respectively. The model simulated results showed good agreements with experimental results. The model could be employed in the design of a full-scale MBBR process for simultaneous removal of organic carbon from effluent STP.