Use of biofilters and suspended-growth reactors to treat VOCs

The greater limits placed on volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions by the Clean Air Act Amendments have stimulated evaluation of various VOC treatment methods. Two applicable gas phase treatment technologies are biofiltration and suspended growth reactors. Biofiltration removes contaminants from gas streams that are passed through a bed of biologically active solids. An aerobic suspended-growth reactor (SGR) removes VOCs by biologically treating contaminated air bubbled through an aqueous suspension of active microorganisms. This research compared the performance of a typical compost biofilter to a SGR for the removal of a common VOC (toluene) from gas streams. The objective was to evaluate the impact of mass loading on process performance. Major performance parameters investigated were (1) mass emitted and elimination capacity, (2) off-gas concentrations exiting each type of reactor for various mass loadings, and (3) removal efficiencies obtained by each type of reactor. The results indicated that SGRs can effectively treat gases containing VOCs. For mass loadings ranging from 5 to 30 mg/l-h, the biofilters and SGRs achieved similar VOC removals, in the range of 96–99.7%. Drying of the biofilter medium occurred at high mass loadings. In the SGRs, at mass loadings greater than 17 mg/l-h, process performance decreased when an unknown colored substance was present.