International Journal of Environmental Science and Development

Abstract—This paper is concerned with the investigation of various phases of the anaerobic treatment of synthetic milk wastewater under variable experimental conditions. The dairy industry wastewaters contain high concentrations of organic matter and therefore requires proper treatment prior to discharge. There is, however, lack of experimental data available for the various important temperature ranges (psychophillic, mesophilic, thermophilic) and other parameters like organic loading rate and retention time. The investigation has been made to comprehend the degree of wastewater stabilization in terms of COD at variable temperature, organic loads and retention times, with and without providing additional seeds for the treatment in the batch reactor. The study is focused on finding out the optimal parameters for efficient biodegradation of organics in the milk wastewaters. These experiments have been performed in a baffled anaerobic batch reactor. Experimental results show that the percentage COD reduction increases with time for all the considered cases. The organic loading affects the COD reduction significantly. The percentage COD reduction at 350C without additional seeds, has been observed at the lower organic loading 1g/l and retention time of 72 h to be 50.00%. Whereas the COD reduction is 83.33% with seeds, under same conditions. As organic loading increases, the percentage COD reduction decreases; a phenomenon that has been observed in all the temperature ranges. The three different peaks of percentage COD reduction have been found out at the above mentioned temperature ranges for both with and without seeds cases.

Index Terms—Dairy Wastewater, Anaerobic Treatment, COD Reduction, Variable Organic Loading.

Abdulsalam Tawfeeq Dawood (corresponding author) is an ICCR PhD Research Scholar with the Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Kashmere Gate, Delhi 110403, India, and also with the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Baghdad, Iraq (Mobile 0091-9899835818; e-mail: abdulsalamtawfiq@yahoo.com ).
Arinjay Kumar is an Associate Professor with the University School of Chemical Technology, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Kashmere Gate, Delhi 110403, India. (Mobile 0091-9868613719; e-mail: arinjay10766@rediffmail.com ).
S. S. Sambi is a Professor with the School of Chemical Technology, Guru Gobind Singh Indhraprastha University, Kashmere Gate, Delhi 110403, India. (Mobile 0091-9312065265; Phone 0091-11-23900241, Fax: 0091-11-23900240, e-mail: sambi1950@yahoo.co.in ).

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Cite: Abdulsalam Tawfeeq Dawood, Arinjay Kumar, S. S. Sambi, "Study on Anaerobic Treatment of Synthetic Milk Wastewater under Variable Experimental Conditions," International Journal of Environmental Science and Development vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 17-23, 2011.