Treatment of pharmaceutical wastewater using mesophilic UASB and hybrid UASB reactors

Biological treatment of pharmaceutical wastewater was performed using upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) and hybrid upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (hybrid UASB) reactors. Pre-treatments were not used in this study. Wastewater was taken from pharmaceutical factory that produced non-penicillin product. UASB and hybrid UASB reactors were evaluated under mesophilic (35±1°C) operating condition. Three hydraulic retention times (HRT) i.e. 5 days, 4 days, and 3 days were used for all reactors. The
reactors were seeded with sludge from aerobic treatment. The chemical oxygen demand (COD) of wastewater was 458-2,217 mg/L. COD removal efficiencies were approximately 93 % and 94% in UASB and hybrid UASB reactors, respectively at HRT of 5 days. The highest methane production was achieved by hybrid UASB reactor at HRT of 4 days. Analysis of
variance (ANOVA) performed on the results showed that, at 5% level of significance; the COD removal was significantly affected by type of reactors and hydraulic retention time.