Abstract:
This research focus on the performance of non-recirculation anaerobic fluidized bed reactor with PVA as media. The experiment setup in 4 laboratory-scale reactors with dimension of 4.58 liter and 2-meter height. Each reactor was operated under different organic loading rate of 5, 15, 25, 40 kg.COD/m3-d and hydraulic retention time of 4.4, 2.93, 2.2, 1.1 hour. The PVA media inside a bioreactor was resized to 500 microns in order to compatible with a fluidized bed configuration without losing their porous and specific gravity. At startup period, all 4 reactors used 89 days for reaching steady-state with organic removal over 80 percent. Likewise, the AnFBR has same organic removal over 80 percent where OLR was changed to 5, 15, 25 and 40 kg.COD/m3-d with HRT 4.4, 2.93, 2.2 and 1.1 hour were applied. It can be proved that AnFBRs work well even HRT is 4 times reduction. The highest biogas production was 93.80 L/d with an average COD to biogas conversion rate was 0.55±0.10 L/gCOD treated. The 1st -order constant at 4.4 and 2.93 hrs was 41.72 day-1 whereas 2.2 and 1.1 hrs the reaction was fit to the Monods Kinetic with kX and Ks was 42.11 g/L-d and 0.09 g/L, respectively. Moreover, the increment of VFA concentration has raised the amount of Methanosarcinar, conversely to Methanosaeta. As summary, PVA-gel was working well as media in non-recirculation anaerobic fluidized bed by removal efficiency was over 80 percent under varied operated conditions. Including that the design equation calculated from combining results of residence time distribution (RTD) and removal efficiency under various operating conditions can be adapted to similarly reactor type.