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Journal of Membrane Science 317 (2008) 4349

Performance and microbial surveying in submerged membrane bioreactor for seafood processing wastewater treatment
Porntip Choksuchart Sridang a,b, , Anthony Pottier c , Christelle Wisniewski c , Alain Grasmick c
b a Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Prince of Songkla University, Songkla 90112, Thailand Membrane Science and Technology Research Center (MSTRC), Prince of Songkla University, Songkla 90112, Thailand c Laboratoire de G nie des Proc d s Eau et Bioproduits, Universit Montpellier II, e e e e Place Eug` ne Bataillon, 34095 Montpellier Cedex 05, France e

Received 10 January 2007; received in revised form 29 October 2007; accepted 5 November 2007 Available online 17 November 2007

Abstract The main objective of this study is to evaluate the performance and the structure of the microbial community of a submerged membrane bioreactor (MBR) for seafood processing wastewater treatment and reuse. This system was operated continuously under favourable biological conditions, with complete biomass retention. In terms of organic removal and membrane performance, the MBR had a good efciency to treat high strength with organic loading variation characteristic of real seafood processing wastewater. The overall results showed the importance of ecological microbial compositions in each stage of development that were different in MBR in comparison with conventional activated sludge. The MBR sludge could tolerate real stresses such as salinity and variation of COD and SS inlet in a wide range, with always good removal efciencies in terms of BOD and COD. At the beginning period, bulking sludge was present. After 700 h of operation, the sludge characteristics not only showed healthy oc formations and good settling, but also conrmed the stable state of the system without overgrowth lamentous bacteria. In evaluating the fouling potential of membrane by cake ltration theory, it was found that soluble substances, soluble microbial products and/or residual organics play a key role in inducing membrane fouling. The W values of the soluble fraction were three times higher than those of the particulates of bacterial oc. 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Membrane bioreactor; Sea food wastewater; Microbial; Fouling potential; Performance

1. Introduction In Thailand, seafood industry represents one of the signicant parts of economic resources for exports, currently ranked in the top 10 export value, with an average annual income of 320 million dollars together with approximately 10% growth rate each year. Interestingly, most expansion is found in the coastal area, especially in southern parts of Thailand. Nevertheless, given such continued growth in industrial activities, water consumption demands unavoidably become a key factor, estimated at 1040 m3 t1 of raw materials [1]. Because
Corresponding author at: Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Prince of Songkla University, 90112 Thailand. Tel.: +66 74212891; fax: +66 74212891. E-mail addresses: porntip.c@psu.ac.th (P.C. Sridang), wisniews@univ-montp2.fr (C. Wisniewski), grasmick@univ-montp2.fr (A. Grasmick).

of limitations in natural resource degradation, wastewater treatment plant is envisaged to favour on-site water reuse and to pass stringent discharge standards. With these requirements, membrane bioreactor (MBR) technology is an attractive option for the treatment of such industrial wastewater. This kind of wastewater contains a large part of food waste easily biodegradable as well as high content of organic nitrogen, and a very small quantity of high pollutant loading; hence the biological way of treatment and separation process by membrane in terms of submerged membrane bioreactor may be envisaged. The systems working in outsideinside ltration mode have been used in several applications of water and wastewater over 30 years and strategy have been developed to prevent and reduce membrane fouling to achieve process optimization in industrial scale [24]. Sub-critical ux concept has been introduced and approached to each MBR condition for long run operation [57]. Hydrodynamic techniques are used to control and minimize

0376-7388/$ see front matter 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.memsci.2007.11.011

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P.C. Sridang et al. / Journal of Membrane Science 317 (2008) 4349 Table 2 Summary of operating conditions Conditions F/M ratio Hydraulic ow rate (L d1 ) Volumetric organic load (gCOD L1 d1 ) Hydraulic retention time (d) Temperature ( C) pH Dissolved oxygen (mg L1 ) Air ow rate (L min1 ) Air loading (m3 air h1 m2 ) Permeate ux (L h1 m2 ) TMP limitation (bar) (d1 ) Values 0.22 5.6 0.28 6.25 2530 7.5 0.5 >2 (45) 20 25 5 0.5

reversible fouling that is caused by the concentration polarization and particle deposition. The adsorption and pore blocking phenomena from macromolecules such as proteins, polysaccharides and organic colloid fractions, created from microbial metabolism and its activities, are still the major cause of membrane permeability decrease [710]. Biological process control not only plays a key role to provide the improvement of treatment efciency but also enhance the ltration performance. In addition, conditioning of biological suspension by coagulant and adsorbent such as powder-activated carbon is also recommended and approved to minimize loads of irreversible fouling [1113]. Based on the potentialities of the MBR process, the objective of this work is to evaluate the performance of a submerged membrane bioreactor and the structure of microbial community present in the reactor for the seafood processing wastewater treatment and reuse. 2. Materials and methods 2.1. Experimental set-up and wastewater Due to the high treatment performance of membrane bioreactor [46], it was selected to treat wastewater from a seafood processing industry such as surimi products. The experiments were carried out on a lab-scale MBR (Fig. 1) where a at sheet membrane was directly immersed in the reactor of 35 l. The membrane used was a polyethersulfone membrane with a pore size of 0.22 m and surface area of 0.047 m2 (initial permeability around 410 L h1 m2 , corresponding to a clean membrane resistance around 2.5 1011 m1 ). Transmembrane pressure (TMP) was monitored by negative manometer equipped at the permeate site. Real sea food processing wastewater was used as feed substrate. It contained a large part of food waste easily bio-degradable as well as high content of

organic nitrogen. The wastewater characteristics are given in Table 1. 2.2. Bacterial cultures and operating conditions A heterotrophic aerobic mixed culture was taken from the conventional activated sludge system of a seafood processing industry, the same where the feed suspension was taken off. This culture had been familiar with feed characteristics, so short inoculation start-up time was required. The operating conditions, summarized in Table 2, were set up to enhance biological process and provide better conditions to favour membrane separation. High-turbulence closed to membrane module was induced by air bubbles. The pH was adjusted by the addition of sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3 ) and the temperature was maintained at room temperature (2528 C). The initial permeability of membrane module was measured and also critical ux was determined according to ux step method [14]. The sub-critical ux permeation is dened and captured at the rate of 5 L h1 m2 . During

Fig. 1. Schematic of a lab-scale MBR (1 = substrate feeding tank, 2 = MBR with air bubbling system and 3 = permeate tank). Table 1 Wastewater characteristics of surimi products Sampling period Parameters pH September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 5.7 5.9 6.3 Salinity (g L1 ) 1.4 1.6 1.5 SS (mg L1 ) 1915 560 553 COD (mg L1 ) 943 1471 1923 BOD5 (mg L1 ) 560 745 1127 TKN (mg L1 ) 162 19 138 TP (mg L1 ) 15 25 32 Protein (mg L1 ) 69 95 284 BOD5 :N:P 100:29:3 100:3:3 100:12:3

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the course of operation no sludge extraction was performed with the objective to favour high sludge age and to minimize sludge production during the course of operation. The TMP limitation value was set up and allowed to reach a critical value of 0.5 bars. A specic cleaning procedure was practiced with different cleaning steps: rinsing by water, back washing with citric acid 1 wt.% at low rate of 15 L h1 m2 for 60 min and directly immersed in sodium hydroxide 1 wt.% cleaning 120 min. The permeability was measured after each cleaning step by ltering tap water to identify and quantify membrane fouling if occurs. 2.3. Membrane fouling prediction The fouling potential of raw biomass suspension and of the soluble part of the suspension obtained after centrifugation (1000 rpm, 1 min) was studied and their lterability was examined in frontal ltration mode. It is supposed that the determinant step reducing the membrane permeability was the cake formation due to particle retention on the membrane surface. Then the specic cake resistance (W) may be evaluated by using the cake ltration law. The experimental set-up, shown in Fig. 2, is a lab scale ltration unit with plane organic membrane. The unit consisted of a pressurized ltration cell with a working volume of 150 mL and the characteristics of each membrane used are given in Table 3. Cake ltration law was used to examine and explain the effect of the various components in suspension tested. The methodology consisted of following up the cumulated volume of ltrate during ltration time for given transmembrane pressures (TMP) at 0.5 and 1 bar without any applied turbulence. The changes in the ltered volume can be described by the cake ltration law, in which the ratio t/V is a linear function of V: t W Rm = V + 2 V 2 P P (1)

Table 3 Membrane characteristics VMWP 04700 Millipore Planea Nitrocelluloseb Dimension (mm, diameter) Filtration area (cm2 ) Pore size ( m) Filtration layer Porosity (%) Thickness ( m) Water permeability (20 C, 1 bar) (L1 h1 m2 ) Membrane resistance Rm (m1 )
a b

Planea Mixed cellulose esterb 47 11.9 0.22 75 180 10,800 2.5 106

47 11.3 0.05 72 105 400 0.9 1012

Type. Membrane material.

where W is the macromolecule or particle concentration (kg m3 ); P transmembrane pressure (Pa); Rm initial membrane resistance (m1 ); V cumulated volume of ltrate (m3 ); t time (s); specic resistance (m kg1 ); dynamic viscosity (Pa s); membrane area (m2 ). The linear plot of t/V with V was used to calculate the product W and/or the specic cake resistance with the objective to quantify the fouling potential of the suspensions tested. 2.4. Samples analysis The system performances were studied by evaluating the substrate degradation, the biomass production and the biomass characteristics in terms of microbial community and lterability. Parameters were analyzed in the inuent, the permeate efuent and the mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) in reactor
Table 4 Parameters and analytical methods Parameters Turbidity Colour pH COD TOC BOD5 TKN TP NO3 MLSS-MLVSS NOM (humic acid) Methods Turbidity meter, HACC Spectrophotometric method (APHA et al., 1998) pH meter According to the Standard methods of APHA et al. (1998)

Soluble proteins

Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of frontal ltration unit set-up (1 = N2 tank equipped with pressure regulator, 2 = pressurized ltration cell and 3 = balance and permeate receiver).

Functional group Sludge oc size Microbial characteristics

Spectrophotometric method using humic acid as the standard solution at a wavelength of 254 nm Spectrophotometric method using Bovine Serum Albumin as the standard solution at a wavelength of 280 nm FTIR Particle size analyzerMALVERN Microscopy-image

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Fig. 3. Critical ux determination of the biological suspension.

Fig. 4. MLSS, MLVSS (a) and F/M evolution (b): MLSS ( ), MLVSS ( ), MLVSS/MLSS and F/M evolution ( ).

through the important parameters along with the analytical methods given in Table 4. 3. Results and discussions 3.1. Critical ux determination The bacterial suspension coming from the seafood processing treatment plant, activated sludge system, was taken to determine the critical ux value. The critical condition in this work was identied by the permeate ux increase step by step and by the TMP evolution during 30 min, as the results shown in Fig. 3. The critical ux value of the tested suspension was between 17 and 19 L h1 m2 , corresponding to the last ux value inducing a constant TMP during 30 min. The MBR experimental study was performed under subcritical condition by working with permeate ux of 5 L h1 m2 , which was three to four times lower than the critical ux value. At the initial period of ltration, the membrane permeability was about 500 L h1 m2 bar1 , with a transmembrane pressure of 510 mbar. 3.2. Biomass characteristics and lterability Physical and biological characteristics of the bacterial suspension in MBR were examined by the measurement of oc size distribution, sludge volume index (SVI), oc morphologies and bacterial community and its composition during operation time. The results showed that the average oc size was constant, in the range of 45.8 + 5.0 m without any signicant change with time. The notable portion of smaller average oc size was in the range of 1015% while the larger ones, over 50 m, was about 2530%. This distribution, different to the one obtained

in conventional activated sludge system, is due probably to the turbulence and the airow rate [15]. The SVI values demonstrated good settling aptitude of the bacterial suspension with values close to 125 mL g1 , 65 mL g1 and 67 mL g1 in the period of 700 h, 1500 h and 2800 h, respectively. In the beginning of the operation, a large part of bulking microbial was present. The presence of such bacterial species is essentially due to the changes in salt concentration, pollutant loadings and raw materials. Bulking is the key problem in most of the seafood wastewater treatment plants because of the bad solidliquid separation in the clarier associated to the conventional activated sludge process, which consequently not operates satisfactorily to meet efuent regulation [16]. Fig. 4(ab) shows the evolution of MLSS and MLVSS concentrations in the suspension in MBR. During the rst 40 days, a relatively constant increase in MLVSS was observed, but after that, suddenly the MLVSS was decreased. This might be related to the nature of substrate variation in BOD5 :N:P ratio, suspended solids of inlet (Fig. 5) and also some problems of operating

Fig. 5. Evolution of suspended solids in the inuent and efuent.

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Fig. 6. Evolution of lterability (t/V vs. V) of raw suspension (a) and of the soluble fraction (b).

conditions inside reactor that can limit biological process. In addition, the accumulation of nitrate-nitrogen might be as toxic compounds. During the running period, a sludge conversion yield of 0.09 gVSS gCODtotal 1 (0.12 gCODParticular gCODtotal 1 ) was obtained. These values are approximately 510 times lower than those measured in conventional activated sludge process [1718]. Fig. 6 and Table 5 present the evolutions of t/V vs. V and W values obtained for different operating conditions tested. Two different ltration experiments, ltration of the raw suspension (particular and soluble fractions of biomass suspension) and ltration of the only soluble fraction, have been studied with the objective to show the inuence of the composition of the biological suspension. During raw suspension ltration, it was found that the hydraulic resistances were increased rapidly at the beginning of the ltration due to a rapid cake deposition. When ltering soluble fraction of biomass suspension, the hydraulic resistances also increased but in a continuous way, the formation of a cake layer being less intensive. The value of W when ltering raw suspension with 0.05 m was lower than the values obtained from 0.22 m. This is because low internal fouling occurred since most of particular fraction could be retained totally on membrane surface faster than soluble fractions could form or penetrate. The results show that the values of W were not quite different between raw bacterial suspension (MLSS, 1.8 g L1 ) and soluble fraction when the ltration was done with 0.22 m membrane for both pressures applied. This is because the ltering of soluble compounds with larger pore sizes of membrane may allow them to adsorb in pore channel. Then a formation of a biogel on membrane occurred. However, the W values of soluble fraction of MLSS in 0.05 m membrane tested were three times higher than the values obtained from the same operations in raw suspensions causing from the internal fouling and the dynamic of cake deposition (reversible fouling) from MLSS on membrane surface.
Table 5 W values obtained from dead end ltration of MLSS tested Type of suspensions W (1012 m2 ) TMP = 0.5 bar 0.22 m Raw suspension Soluble fraction 710 710 0.05 m 420 1280 TMP = 1 bar 0.22 m 1130 1130 0.05 m 560 1980

This fouling potential caused by the arrangement of foulant structure which was provided more porosity, acted as secondary lter layer especially when working in membrane with pore size of 0.05 m which was close to soluble compounds, than the foulant layer of soluble compounds. High applied pressures had a signicant effect on the increased resistance during ltration particularly with 0.05 m membrane over 0.22 m membrane since most of the particular materials retaining on membrane surface were compressed. These fouling mechanisms implied that the interaction of soluble elements with the membrane matrix induced more fouling than phenomena caused by the presence of particular elements. This conrms that the macromolecular compounds present in the soluble part and in the supernatant of the activated sludge (notably protein, polysaccharides, humic acid, etc.) have a great fouling potential inuence to the lterability of suspensions [19]. We can notice that the quality of the ltrate was excellent in terms of turbidity (lower than 0.3 NTU) and colour for all suspension tested. Raw biomass suspension analysis was performed to investigate the morphology of bacteria and other microbial composition (Fig. 7) that may be effected by some stresses occurring such as salinity variations (about 23 g L1 ). Salinity represents part of salt chloride concentration and some variation of COD and SS loading. These variations are due to experimental runs under real conditions of wastewater inlet. Total bacteria count in seeding MLSS was nearly 2.62 107 CFU mL1 . It appeared slightly loosen oc type with free swimming cilia containing higher than xed cilia and rotifer. Floc density increased with time as lamentous bacteria presented in microstructure of oc after 700 h operation. Survey of microbial present in MBR and their characteristics not only showed healthy oc formations and good settling but also conrmed the system came to stable state after 700 h operated without overgrowth lamentous bacteria occurred in macrostructure oc consideration. Microbial composition, in each stage of development, was different from conventional activated sludge working with same F/M ratio consideration in spite of salt concentrations in the biological suspension part. The presence of metazoa with time was observed such as swimming cilia in the beginning, xed ciliates after 700 h and rotifers in MBR tank after 1500 h (Fig. 7). This character indicated the stability of MBR system with a very good quality of sludge oc. The behaviours of biological activity seem similar to unsalted wastewater type. This result conveys the tolerance

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P.C. Sridang et al. / Journal of Membrane Science 317 (2008) 4349

Fig. 7. Floc morphology investigation and group of metazoa observed with time seed oc at start-up period with free swimming cilia (100), (b) oc and xed cilia after 700 h (200) and (c) oc and rotifer (400) after 1500 h.

Table 6 Evaluation of efciency of MBR and real seafood wastewater plant Systems MBR AS COD (mg L1 ) 50 187 20 BOD5 (mg L1 ) 10 28 1.0 Turbidity (NTU) 2 38 8.0 TKN (mg L1 ) 510 104 4

Fig. 8. Evaluation of COD degradation: inuent ( ), treated water ( ).

characteristics of microbial towards salt concentrations in the conditions applied. 3.3. Organic removal efciency The experimental results strongly conrm the effectiveness of the MBR, with permeation quality in terms of BOD5 lower than 10 mg L1 (99% removal rate), while soluble COD remains high at about 100 mg L1 (85% removal rate) during 1000 h of ltration. It was found that after 1000 h (40 days), the concentration of COD in the permeate was decreased to lower than 100 mg L1 . This was due to the slow down of kinetic of biomass increasing phase. Figs. 8 and 9 show a high COD removal and complete colour elimination from an initial yellow colour observed during 4 months. After time passing, the values of COD decreased dramatically to lower than 50 mg L1 with less yellow colour (clear permeate). Yet the physical quality is excellent with the turbidity lower than 2 NTU. The organic nitrogen and NH3 in

terms of TKN removal was presented very low of 5 mg L1 with an efciency of removal observed about 7095%. The soluble residual COD in the permeate with a yellow light colour shows partial difculties to degrade of some compounds. In addition, TOC was equal to 1 + 0.2 mg L1 and UV absorbance 254 nm represented humic fraction. It still has a residual humic fraction in permeate of about 0.050.02 mg L1 while the protein concentration decreased from 60 to 410 mg L1 in the inuent to 3671 mg L1 in the permeate. So, the total removal rate achieved about 7090%. This may imply that the membrane used could separate some fractions of extracellular polymeric substances extracted from bacterial cells after 7002800 h. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) technique was used to identify the variations of functional groups of organics compounds presented in the MBR permeate. Several functional groups were identied in the yellow permeate (beginning of the operation). Some of these organic compounds, with frequency of 2088 cm1 (C C) and 932 cm1 (CS), were not found after time passing in the clear permeate. The treatment performances of this MBR have been compared with the ones obtained with the conventional activated sludge, used on-site to treat the seafood wastewater. The results conrm strongly the effectiveness of this MBR over conventional system (Table 6). The MBR showed two to three times higher removal rate of COD and BOD5 with 20 times lower

Fig. 9. Residual turbidity and colour in permeate.

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values of turbidity than activated sludge. Moreover, the separation performance of MBR was very constant without any variation of TMP. 4. Conclusions The operating conditions for the biological treatment, the ltration performance and the structure of microbial community were studied in the MBR system in seafood processing wastewater treatment. It was found that a lab-scale MBR was effective when operated under enhanced biological and sub-critical conditions. The overall results showed the importance of microbial compositions, in each stage of development, that were different in MBR in comparison with conventional activated sludge. A MBR sludge could adapt effectively to real seafood processing wastewater and tolerate real stresses such as salinity and variation of COD loading inlet in a wide range, with always good removal efciencies in terms of BOD5 and COD. In the chosen operating conditions, the separation performance of MBR was very constant without any variation of TMP. However, the study of the lterability of the biological suspension has shown that the interaction of soluble elements with the membrane matrix induced more fouling than phenomena caused by the presence of particular elements. This conrms that the macromolecular compounds present in the soluble part and in the supernatant of the activated sludge (notably protein, polysaccharides, humic acid, etc.) have a great fouling potential inuence to the lterability of suspensions. According to these results (good permeate quality, poor sludge production, adaptability to inuent change) the development of operating conditions (subcritical permeation, high sludge age, biological process and aeration fouling control) of MBR process can be envisaged to favour treating high strength and/or complex substrate and to easy set up for on-site water reclamation with the efuent quality passing stringent discharge standards. References
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