Anaerobic digestion is an effective method of removing pollutants from wastewaters and one of the most frequently used methods for the stabilization of redundant biological treatment plant’s activated sludge. Microorganisms digest organic matter under the anaerobic conditions, producing mostly methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) as by-products, named biogas, which can be used as an energy source. Activated sludge from the wastewater treatment plant and animal manure have proved to be problematic substrates, since they contain antibiotic substances and products of their degradation. Antibiotics and other chemical compounds can inhibit the activity of microorganisms involved in the process of anaerobic digestion and thus decrease the biogas production, consequently reducing the energy recovery from waste material.
In this study, anaerobic digestion experiment was performed to determine the ozonation efficiency for the pre-treatment of anaerobic waste, contaminated with three different antibiotics (amoxicillin, tiamulin and levofloxacin). Ozonation is one of the advanced oxidation processes, which can break down complex organic molecules into smaller and more easily degradable molecules. The purpose of the thesis is to find out, if ozonation of contaminated aerobic sludge can be used to eliminate the inhibitory effects of antibiotics on anaerobic microorganisms and to assure the production of sufficient amounts of biogas.
All three antibiotics had negative impact on the anaerobic digestion. The results showed that ozonation contributes to an increased production of biogas during anaerobic digestion, to an increased rate of CH4 in the biogas and eliminates the inhibitory effect of antibiotics. The addition of amoxicillin or tiamulin inhibited the biogas production by 20 %, while the addition of levofloxacin inhibited it by 26 %. In all three samples, contaminated with antibiotics, the ozonation eliminated the inhibitory effects. Compared to the non-ozonated contaminated aerobic sludge, the amount of biogas increased by 74 % after ozonation of the sample with amoxicillin, in the case of the sample with tiamulin by 69 % and in the case of the sample with levofloxacin by 55 %. We also found that ozonation increases the percentage of CH4 in the biogas. Compared to the non-ozonated contaminated active sludge, the percentage of CH4 after the ozonation increased by 12 % in the case of amoxicillin, by 14 % in the case of tiamulin and by 18 % in the case of levofloxacin.
|