Water, essential to life is drying up around the world.

Water scarcity is one of the alarming

challenges that the modern world face today. Water shortages, deterioration of water quality,
and environmental constraints have led to an augmented interest in recovering and recycling
water in many parts of the world. This shortage of water drives people to recycle the effluents
from different fields such as agricultural effluents, plantation effluents, industrial and farming
effluents (Ahmad et al., 2003). Plantation effluents include effluents from palm oil mills,
rubber plantations, coconut mills etc (Anwar et al., 2019).
The role of palm oil in economic development and environmental degradation is a highly
debated topic. Oil palm is a versatile crop, with palm oil and other derivatives used for
cooking and to make margarine, detergents, and cosmetics. In the last decade, some countries
have used palm oil as feedstock for biofuels as they diversify their energy supplies (Soh et
al., 2003; Murphy, 2007; Ngando-Ebongue et al., 2012). The increasing global demand for
food, energy, and other industrial processes correspondingly increase the demand for palm oil
(Purnomo et al., 2020).
Indonesia is well known as the largest palm oil producer in the world with 22.2 million ha
plantation area and crude palm oil (CPO) production reached 31 million tons per year (BPS,
2015; Directorate General of Estate Crops, 2016). However, this palm oil production has led
to the accumulation of a huge amount palm oil mill effluent (POME) disposed as liquid
wastes (Prasetyo et al., 2018). POME is a thick brownish liquid of pH around 4.0–5.0, with a
discharge temperature of 80–90°C. POME consists of organic materials such as lignin,
carotene, phenolic compounds, and pectin, which are at concentrations 4700 ppm, 8 ppm,
5800 ppm, and 3400 ppm, respectively (Choong et al., 2018; Iskandar et al., 2018; Khadaroo
et al., 2019b). The estimation POME was 2.5 tons POME / ton CPO (Ho et al., 1984). POME
contains extremely high organic compounds and generally measured by chemical oxygen
demand (COD) and biological oxygen demand (BOD) which were about 30,800 and 7,800
ppm, respectively (Wong et al., 2009; Taha et al., (2014). In addition, even the COD and
BOD can reach 96,300 and 53,200 ppm at some palm oil companies (Singh et al., 2013).
POME consists of 95–96% water, 0.6–0.7% oil and 4–5% solids (Ahmad et al., 2003).

Parameter Concentration
Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) 23,100 - 55,200
Chemical oxygen demand (COD) 55,100 - 86,300
pH 4.0 - 5.0
Total carbohydrate 16,200 - 20,000
Total nitrogen (TN) 820 - 910
Ammoniumenitrogen 25 - 35
 Total phosphorus (TP) 95 - 120
Phosphorus 14 - 20
Oil 2000 - 2500
Total solid (TS) 30,000 - 42,000
Volatile suspended solids (VSS) 8400 - 12,000
All values are in mg/L except pH.
Reference: (Singh et al., 2013)

It has high turbidity and color resulting from high organic matter content, suspended solids
and a trace amount of minerals and heavy metals (Hwang et al., 1978). This organic content
makes POME unfit for drinking if not treated. Therefore, a proper treatment method to
remove the organic matter, minerals and heavy metals is required in the recycling of drinking
water from POME (Anwar et al., 2019).
Several innovative treatment technologies have been developed and applied by palm oil mills
to treat POME; conventional biological treatments of anaerobic or facultative digestion are
the most commonly used (Quah et al., 1982). However, this biological treatment system
needs proper maintenance and monitoring as the processes rely solely on microorganisms to
break down the pollutants. The microorganisms are very sensitive to changes in the
environment and thus great care has to be taken to ensure that a conducive environment is
maintained for the micro- organisms in which to thrive. It also generates vast amount of
biogas. This biogas contains methane, carbon dioxide and trace amounts of hydrogen
sulphide; these gases are corrosive and odorous. The treated wastewater cannot be reused in
the plant, and it is being discharged into the environment (Ahmad et al., 2003).