Performance evaluation of modified anaerobic migrating blanket reactor (M-AMBR) at varying temperatures under ambient...

The present study has been carried out on pilot scale modified anaerobic migrating blanket reactor (M-AMBR) to evaluate the performance under varying ambient temperatures and different mixing intervals. At steady state, with intermittent mechanical mixing, COD removal of 80% at 4-h HRT and 6.5 kg COD/m3.d. OLR could be achieved with synthetic wastewater containing glucose. The COD removal efficiency of 80% and 70% was achieved at a 4-h and 7-h HRT at the ambient temperatures of 30 +/- 1 degree C and 20 +/- 1 degree C respectively. The % COD removal increased from 58 to 82 at 4-h HRT when ambient temperature gradually increased from 20 +/- 1 to 28 +/- 1 degree C showing the effect of temperature on performance. COD removal of 80% was observed at HRT 8-h without mixing at 30 +/- 1 degree C indicating that mechanical mixing can be obviated by increasing HRT. However, intermittent mixing is required to maintain the reactor stability in terms of VFA/TA. Under the hydraulic stress % COD removal decreased from 68 to 58 when HLR was double.