Treatment of industrial lactose production process wastewater with high organic pollution and evaluation for energy production purposes

The primary aim of this study is to investigate the treatment of delactose wastewater, which is produced from whey protein concentrate (WPC) during cheese production and contains high organic pollution, in a Upflow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket (UASB) process under different organic loading rates, and to determine the optimum process conditions. In this context, the efficiency of delactose treatment and methane production in the UASB system has been examined at various organic loading rates (OLR). The study assesses the operating conditions of the UASB reactor (pH, HRT, etc.) and the responses of the anaerobic system (volatile fatty acids, total alkalinity, gas production, COD removal, etc.). In this thesis work, delactose was utilized as an wastewater source, and a comprehensive characterization analysis was conducted. It was determined that delactose has an acidic pH value (5,12) and contains 22,5% total solids and 14.28% lactose. The total and dissolved Chemical Oxygen Demand values were found to be 235 ± 3,4 g/L and 213 ± 1,1 g/L, respectively. The high organic content level of delactose, which has a high pollution load, demonstrates its suitability as a substrate for anaerobic treatment processes. In this study, four different organic loading rates were examined in the UASB system. System opeation was started with 1 kg COD/m3 organic loading rate and increased to 2,3 and 4 kg COD/ m3 in time. Over a period of 143 days of operation, the COD removal efficiencies obtained in the UASB were recorded as 97,4%, 97,4%, 98,0%, and 99.3%, respectively. The methane production efficiencies were obtained as 181,2, 147,0, 196,5, and 189 mL CH4/gCODremoved, respectively. These results indicate that the system can effectively treat high organic content delactose wastewater and has significant methane production potential.