Use of baked clay media as biomass supports for anaerobic filters

Abstract

Several types of support media have found use for biomass retention in treatment of food industries wastewaters by anaerobic filters. This study shows the advantages of baked clay support media. The study involves three laboratory upflow anaerobic fixed-bed digestors, using several bed porosities, retention times and organic loading rates. The filters with the baked clay support media reduced the chemical oxygen demand by up to 97.5%. A first order rate reaction adequately defines the overall chemical oxygen demand removal mechanism in the anaerobic fixed-bed reactor.