Investigation of phenolic compounds recovery from brewery wastewater with coupled membrane and adsorption process

Abstract

Recovery of phenolic compounds from food-processing by-products represents an interest for various industrial sectors. The potential of a coupled ultrafiltration and adsorption or ion exchange resin process was analyzed to recover phenolic compounds from a brewery liquid residue. Ultrafiltration yielded a 95% removal of turbidity-causing compounds without significant modification of the chemical composition of brewery by-products. After a pH optimization step, ten different macroporous resins, including MN202, SP700, HP2MGL, LXA8302, LWT510, XAD16N, FPX66, WA20, WA30 and SCAV4, were screened for phenolic compounds sorption. Resins were selected through a multi-step batch test procedure according to their performance in phenolic compounds adsorption capacity, phenolic compounds selectivity compared to carbohydrates and price. The strong base resin SCAV4 with OH- counter ion showed the highest adsorption capacity, 35.4 ± 0.8 mg·gdryresin−1, with selective sorption of phenolic compounds. Higher temperatures of 48 °C improved the adsorption and desorption performances of LXA8302 and SCAV4 resins, compared to 25 °C. Up to 70% of phenolic compounds were desorbed from adsorption resin with adequate solvent.