Abstract

MOLINA, César F.; MARQUETTI, Federico; QUAIA, Eugenio A.  and  MACHADO, Walter D.. Arranque y seguimiento del proceso de granulación en un reactor anaeróbico utilizando vinaza como sustrato. Rev. ind. agric. Tucumán [online]. 2020, vol.97, n.1, pp.52-55. ISSN 1851-3018.

Anaerobic digestion is a recommended process to treat effluents with high organic loads. One of the most widespread technologies is that of the upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor. Under certain conditions, the anaerobic microflora of the sludge can merge together to create granular structures with a diameter of a few millimeters in which all microbial species necessary for the process of biodigestión can be found. There have been many studies about these granules using simple substrates such as glucose; nevertheless, there are not many publications about granulation using complex substrates such as industrial effluents. This study evaluates the granulation process carried out in a 155 L UASB reactor using activated sludge as inoculum, and vinasse as the substrate. The reactor was running for around 7 month (218 days). The operational parameters used, were the organic loading rate and upflow velocity that were constants on 1gCOD/l.d and 1 m/h respectively. In these conditions, the organic matter was reduced by 77.9% and the active biomass presented an increase of volatile suspended solids around 45%. Thirty days after the stability of the system was achieved, granules of 0.2 to 0.4 mm were observed and, towards the end of the test, granules with a diameter of 4 mm were detected.

Keywords : anaerobic reactor; vinasse; granulation.

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