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Andrzej B. Jarzbski
Silesian University of Technology
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Received 4 February 2004; received in revised form 5 December 2004; accepted 28 December 2004
Abstract
Concise model of bioltration based on a linear driving force concept, that takes into account adsorption of pollutant in the support phase
and its biodegradation therein with the rate governed by a modied three-parameter Monod-type expression, was shown to be suitable to
portray the transient behavior of biolters arising from the periodic operation. Good agreement between simulations and experiments was
obtained for the biodegradation of methyl-ethyl-ketone or n-butanol on a pre-selected bark bed in a broad range of operating conditions.
2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Bioltration; Periodic operation; Bioreactors; Kinetics; Environment; Mathematical modelling
1. Introduction
Biotreatment of off-gases containing volatile organic
compounds (VOCs) is a reliable and cost-effective technology for VOCs removal and there are scores of papers addressing its application to specic problems. At rst glance
its principles are simple, but when the process is examined
in more detail it appears quite complex, as Ottengraf and
Van den Oever indicated in their pioneering work in 1983.
To obtain its deeper understanding and to hammer up tools
suitable for the scale-up, design and operation control, a
number of models of different complexity has been proposed (Devinny et al., 1999; Hodge and Devinny, 1995;
Amanullah et al., 1999; Zarook et al., 1997; Mohseni and
Allen, 2000; McNevin and Barford, 2000, and references
therein). In the most practical situations, the level of VOCs
emission varies slowly and hence the industrial biolters
are often subjected to steady-state or pseudo-steady-state
Corresponding author. Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty
of Chemistry, Silesian University of Technology, M. Strzody 7, Gliwice
44-100, Poland. Tel.: +48 32 2371 461; fax:+48 32 237 1461.
E-mail address: a.jarzeb@iich.gliwice.pl (A.B. Jarzebski).
0009-2509/$ - see front matter 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ces.2004.12.035
2846
jCi
j2 C i
jCi
1
= DL
w
[kigads (qi qi )]
2
jt
jx
jx
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
jqi
= kigads (qi qi ) rs
jt
(6)
qi (x, 0) = 0.
qiN
,
Km + q i
(1)
(7)
Ci
.
m2
(8)
3. Experiments
Two identical lab-scale biolters were used. Each biolter
consisted of a jacketed glass column with the inner diameter of 0.175 m and a height of 0.5 m, the systems of odor
generation and air prehumidication equipped with the appropriate control devices as shown in Fig. 1. Columns were
lled with the pre-selected natural pine tree bark pieces of
2847
Table 1
Operating parameters of the biolters
VOC
C1 (g/m)3
V (m3 /h)
n-butanol
MEK
0.0050.12
0.0050.10
47
210
size 0.603 mm, supported on the sieve plate to ensure a homogeneous distribution of gas ow over the cross section
of the lter bed. The organic pollutant was introduced into
the inowing air prehumidied to about 9496% of relative
humidity to avoid drying of the lter bed. The lter material
was irrigated daily with water pumped overhead to maintain
proper moisture of the support and weekly with an aqueous
solution containing NH4 NO3 , (NH4 )2 SO4 and KH2 PO4 in
order to supply the microorganisms with the additional nutrients.
MEK and n-butanol were analyzed by injecting grab samples into an HP 5890 GC equipped with capillary column
(Fused Silica) and FID detector.
Table 1 summarizes the operating parameters of the biolters.
After inoculation of beds using a diluted sludge of
microorganisms prevailed by Pseudomonas and Bacillus
species, the biolter was subjected to the run-up, aimed at
the formation of an active bed. This period took about 34
months during which the biolter was run for about 910 h
a day with an air stream loaded with organics, initially
1020 mg/m3 and later 20100 mg/m3 . During main experiments, the inlet pollutant concentration and air ow rate
were kept constant over a day, but they varied from day to
0.16
n-butanol
MEK
2
C1= 0.0004 q* R = 0.9653
0.12
C1[g/m3]
0.08
0.04
0.00
0
100
200
300
q*[g/m3]
Fig. 2. Variation of MEK and butanol concentration in gas phase vs. odor
concentration in stationary phase C1 = f (q ).
2848
Table 2
The parameters used in simulations
0.1
MEK
kigads (1/s)
N
(g2N /m3N s)
Km (g/m3 )
DL (m2 /s)
m2
0.001
1.5
1.25 103
0.555
5 105
4 104
0.65
0.003
1.35
0.4 103
0.025
5 105
2 103
0.58
0.08
0.06
C2 [g/m3]
n-butanol
0.04
0.02
0
0
t [h]
Fig. 3. Variation of outlet concentration of BuOH in air vs. working time
for various inlet concentrations, = 2.7 (s).
0.04
0.03
C2 [g/m3]
Parameter
0.02
0.01
0
0
t [h]
Fig. 4. Variation of outlet concentration of BuOH in air vs. working time
for various inlet concentrations, = 3.6 2.2 (s).
0.1
0.08
0.6
C2 [g/m3]
0.06
0.8
0.04
0.4
0.02
0.2
0
0
12
16
20
k [s]
t [h]
0.04
Fig. 7. Bioltration efciency for BuOH and MEK vs. contact time for
steady-state operation.
5. Conclusions
0.03
C2 [g/m3]
2849
0.02
0.01
0
0
2
t [h]
Notation
Ci
DL
H
kigads
Km
m2
N
qi
qi
rs
2850
t
V
w
x
working time, s
volumetric gas ow rate, m3 /h, m3 /s
gas velocity, m/s
distance, m
Greek letters
k
contact time, s
porosity of the bed, m3 /m3
rate constant of bioltration process, 1/h, 1/s
Subscripts
ads
i
Adsorbent
component i
Superscript
equilibrium
References
Amanullah, Md., Farooq, S., Viswanathan, S., 1999. Modeling and
simulation of a biolter. Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research
38, 27652774.