Treatment of Amman Slaughterhouse Wastewater by Anaerobic Baffled Reactor

Abstract

The wastewater from Amman slaughterhouse was treated by a lab-scale (10.45 L) anaerobic baffled reactor. The performance of the treatment system was evaluated over 152 days by monitoring several parameters such as COD, BOD, solids’ concentration, and biogas production at two temperature scenarios. During the first 103 days, the reactor was operated at ambient temperatures ranging from 15 to 23 °C resulting in average COD and total solids’ removal efficiencies of 70% and 33%, respectively. Afterwards, the reactor temperature was controlled at 40 °C which resulted in improving the COD and total solids’ removal efficiencies to 90% and 44%, respectively. The gas production was minimal during the first 103 days as there was no observable biological activity at the relatively low operating temperatures. After the temperature was raised to 40 °C, the biogas production increased considerably to reach a steady state rate of 122 mL per day. The effluent produced from the anaerobic digestion of slaughterhouse wastewater was comparable to the Jordanian Standards for reclaimed water reuse in irrigation and surface water discharge.