Poultry Slaughterhouse Wastewater Treatment Using an Integrated Biological and Electrocoagulation Treatment System: Process Optimisation Using Response Surface Methodology

Abstract

The feasibility of a biological (EcoflushTM) and/or electrocoagulation (EC) treatment system in removing chemical oxygen demand (COD) and fats, oils, and grease (FOG) from poultry slaughterhouse wastewater (PSW) were studied. The response surface methodology (RSM) was used to identify the optimum operating condition for EC and its integration with EcoflushTM as a pre-treatment for the removal of lipids. The optimum operating conditions were obtained at a pH of 3.05, a current density of 66.9 A/m2, 74-min of treatment time, and without Ecoflush™. These conditions produced a high-quality clarified effluent after 92.4% COD reduction and 99% FOG reduction. The treatment with EcoflushTM only resulted in 85–99% FOG reduction, 20–50% COD reduction, and odourless effluent. However, the combination of both processes (EcoflushTM and EC) did not yield a significant difference (F test, p > 0.05) when compared to the performance of EC alone. Despite the low removal percentages of nitrogen and phosphorus, the present study proved that EC is an effective method for the removal of COD and FOG, rendering an effluent that meets the permissible discharge standards for the City of Cape Town. The novel Ecoflush™ also proved to be very efficient in the removal of FOG from PSW.

Kinetics of Obtaining Microalgal Biomass and Removal of Organic Contaminants in Photobioreactors Operated with Microalgae—Study Case: Treatment of Wastewater from a Poultry Slaughterhouse

“…(Figure 15a) was similar at the three tested doses, with readings in the range of 0.20 to 0.40 units, while in the Spirulina maxima strain (Figure 15b), this coordinate had lower results, between 0.40 and 0.04. Since this axis indicates the hue between red and green, it can be interpreted that both samples have a very slight tendency toward red, which may be because the residual water among its components has blood from processed birds [57]. Subsequently, the values decrease until they almost reach zero, which indicates closeness to the white tone in the samples.…”

Integrated Hydrogen Peroxide, Sono, and Heterogeneous Photocatalysis Technologies: A Novel Technique for Ammonia and Phosphorus Removal in Real Poultry Slaughterhouse Wastewater

“…FAO (2023) declared that the poultry meat production sector increased from 133.6 million tons in 2019 to 136.0 million tons in 2020. However, the processing of poultry includes slaughtering, defeathering, evisceration, washing, and chilling steps that generate large amounts of wastewater that is characterized by high loads of organic components, with chemical oxygen demand (COD) measured between 1,250 and 15,900 mg/L (Bustillo- Lecompte et al, 2016;Abdelhay et al, 2020); biological oxygen demand (BOD) concentration of 1,602 mg/L (Yaakob et al, 2018); ammonium-N (N 4 + -N) concentration of 53-312 mg/L (Ngobeni et al, 2022); and orthophosphate (PO 4 -P) concentration of 9.65 mg/L (Bayar et al, 2022). Additionally, based on previous research (Rinquest et al, 2019;Williams et al, 2019), it is expected that 80-90% of a processing plant's total water use will be discharged as poultry slaughterhouse wastewater (PSW), consuming an average of 26.5 L per processed bird (Fatima et al, 2021).…”

“…The removal of nutrients such as ammonia and phosphate from PSW has emerged as a prominent area of investigation, as evidenced by the attention it has received in recent studies (Hajaya and Pavlostathis, 2013;Türkdoğan et al, 2018). Despite the many different available techniques, such as dissolved air flotation (DAF), electrocoagulation (EC), coagulationflocculation (CF), aerobic and anaerobic processes, membrane techniques, reverse osmosis, etc., the toxicity of this type wastewater continues to be inadequate, with contaminant levels after treatment above the legally permitted values (Meiramkulova et al, 2020;Musa et al, 2021;TeránHilares et al, 2021;Ngobeni et al, 2022;Toh et al, 2023). In addition, high operational and maintenance costs, low efficiency in solid-liquid separation, high chemical requirements, high sludge generation, long hydraulic retention times, high energy requirements, membrane clogging, and associated additional chemical demands are different weaknesses of these processes (Bustillo-Lecompte & Mehrvar 2015;Moussa et al, 2017;Shahediet al, 2020;Mousazadeh et al, 2021).…”

Treatment of Wastewater in The Fruit and Vegetable Process Industries (FVPI) Through Electrocoagulation Process- Analysis Using RSM

“…In the past decade, research has focused on wastewater treatment techniques including electrocoagulation (EC) for the treatment of industrial wastewater streams [7]. The removal of fats, oil, and grease (FOG) [8], [9], the dye industry, household waste, and wastewater from chicken slaughterhouses [10], [8]. These topics make up the majority of the examined EC research.…”

“…An excellent substitute for FVPI treatment is electrocoagulation (EC), an electrochemical process that can handle variations in pollutant quality and quantity and remove persistent pollutants like dye and FOG from wastewater [8], [9]. According to [10], the primary benefits of the EC process are (i) the quick breakdown of organic compounds, (ii) the absence of the need to add extra compounds, (iii) environmental compatibility, (iv) high efficiency in pollutant degradation, and (v) cost-effectiveness. EC uses redox processes to break down organic pollutants by applying electric current.…”