Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering, Vol.27, No.11, 2799-2806, 2019
Nanohybrid membrane in algal-membrane photoreactor: Microalgae cultivation and wastewater polishing
Microalgae cultivation has gained tremendous attention in recent years due to its great potential in green biofuel production and wastewater treatment application. Membrane technology is a great solution in separating the microalgae biomass while producing high quality of permeate for recycling. The main objective of this study was to investigate the filtration peifomunce of Ag/GO-PVDF (silver/graphene oxide-polyvinylidene fluoride) membrane in an algalmembrane photoreactor (A-MPR) by benchmarking with a commercial PVDF (com-PVDF) membrane. In this study, Chlorella vulgaiis microalgae was cultivated in synthetic wastewater in an A-MPR for ammoniacal-nitrogen and phosphorus recovery and the wastewater was further filtered using Ag/GO-PVDF and com-PVDF membranes to obtain high quality water. Spectrophotometer was used to analyze the chemical oxidation demand (COD), ammoniacal nitrogen (NH3-N) and phosphate (PO43-). The concentration of proteins and carbohydrates was measured using Bradford method and phenol-sulfuric acid method, respectively. The COD of the synthetic wastewater was reduced from (180.5 +/- 5.6) ppm to (82 +/- 2.6) ppm due to nutrient uptake by microalgae. Then, the Ag/GO-PVDF membrane was used to further purify the miatialgae cultivated wastewater, resulting in a low COD permeate of (31 +/- 4.6) ppm. The high removal rate of proteins (100%) and carbohydrates (86.6%) as the major foulant in microalgae filtration, with low membrane fouling propensity of Ag/GO-PVDF membrane is advantageous for the sustainable development of the microalgae production. Hence, the integrated A-MPR system is highly recommended as a promising approach for microalgae cultivation and wastewater polishing treatment. (C) 2019 The Chemical Industry and Engineering Society of China, and Chemical Industry Press Co., Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:Algal-membrane photoreactor;Nanohybrid membrane;Wastewater polishing;Microalgal cultivation;Nutrient recovery