Hanna Virpiranta, Samuel Okyere Abayie, Jarmo Mäkikangas, Mika Puirava, Kirsi

Koivula, Tiina Leiviskä,

Treatment of fish processing plant wastewater using dissolved air flotation and
pilot-scale biochar column filtration,
Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering,
Volume 11, Issue 5,
2023,
110853,
ISSN 2213-3437,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jece.2023.110853.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2213343723015920)
Abstract: Wastewaters from fish processing cause a high organic load for municipal
wastewater treatment and can interfere with treatment operations due to their high
oil and grease content. In the present study, a modular dissolved air flotation
(DAF) unit was used to remove oil, grease and other suspended solids from fish
processing plant wastewater. After DAF treatment, the residual particles and
nutrients were adsorbed onto a mixture of hemp and spruce biochar in a pilot-scale
column filtration system. The proposed integrated treatment process aims to improve
the quality of the fish processing wastewater, facilitate water reuse, and recover
the dissolved nutrients in a reusable form. The DAF treatment removed nearly all
the oil and grease from the wastewater. Also, chemical oxygen demand, turbidity and
phosphorus concentration clearly decreased during the DAF process. The biochar
filtration further clarified the DAF-treated wastewater and partly adsorbed the
residual nutrients. Furthermore, in the spent biochar mixture, the nitrogen and
phosphorus content increased significantly (N to 9.1–10.5 mg/g, P to 0.32–
1.38 mg/g), which indicates the improved properties of the biochar as a possible
soil conditioner.
Keywords: Biochar; Dissolved air flotation; Fish processing wastewater; Grease
removal; Oil removal; Nutrient recovery