Two-phase anaerobic co-digestion of olive mill wastes in semi-continuous digesters at mesophilic temperature

This study investigates for the first time, on laboratory scale, the possible exploitation of the advantages of two-phase anaerobic digestion for treating a mixture of olive mill wastewater (OMW) and olive mill solid waste (OMSW) using two sequencing semi-continuous digesters operated at mesophilic temperature (37 ± 2 °C). The experiments were conducted at hydraulic retention times (HRTs) of 14 and 24 days corresponding to organic loading rates (OLRs) ranging from 5.54 to 14 g COD/L/day in the first stage (acidifier) and at HRTs of 18, 24 and 36 days corresponding to OLRs ranging from 2.28 to 9.17 g COD/L/day in the second stage (methanizer). The results indicated that volatile fatty acids (VFA) concentrations increased with the increase of either HRT or feed concentration and their high values were obtained with the most concentrated influent (196 ± 5 g COD/L) digested at the longest HRT (24 days) corresponded to an OLR of 8.17 g COD/L/d. Furthermore, two-phase anaerobic digestion system has given the best performances concerning methane productivity, soluble COD (SCOD) and phenol removal efficiencies and effluent quality compared to those given by conventional one-phase anaerobic digestion (AD) reactors.