Acronym GRAND-SEA
Category
Marine Biotechnology
Title Sustainable systems development based on granular biomass for the treatment of wastewater produced in seafood industries Programme Nat. Programme (supported by ESIF)
Instrument (FP6)
Contact Type (FP7)
Strand (Interreg)
NA
Theme (FP7)
Activity Area (FP6)
Regional Area (Interreg)
Action (COST)
NA
Specific Programme (FP7)
NA
Funding source National-European Coordinator NA Coordinator email NA
Coordinator institution
USC - University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain)
Institutions involved
NA
Start year 2015 End year 2018 Funding (€) € 204,490 Website https://biogroup.usc.es/grand-sea Summary The general aim of this project is the development of an innovative technology based on granular sludge for the treatment of fish-processing wastewater. This industrial sector has been chosen due to its importance in the feed industry in galicia, where it accounts for 86% of the spanish and the 10% of whole world production of this sector. Nowadays the fish-producing industries experience restrictions of surface availability, due to their proximity to the coast, which difficult the implantation of the corresponding wastewater treatment plants. Furthermore, the discharge limits of their produced effluents are very restrictive, to limit the environmental impact of these companies, specially when these effluents are disposed in sensitive areas like the marine water.
The present project is intended for proving that the systems based on granular biomass are a sustainable alternative to substitute or complement the conventional existing treatment systems in the fish-processing industry. For this two alternatives will be evaluated.
Initially an granular reactor will be tested, for the first time, to treat the effluent from a seafood processing industry to remove simultaneosly organic matter, nitrogen and phosphorous. This system is conceived with the aim of substituting a complete treatment of seafood industrial effluents by a single unit. The expected advantages rely on the reduction of the surface necessary for implantation (75%), the reduction of the amount of produced sludge (30-50%) and the improvement in the effluent (50% for nitrogen, 60% for phosphorous and 10% for cod removal).
In the second option the granular system will be tested as a nitrogen removal unit to be placed after an anaerobic digester or a conventional activated sludge (cas) where organic matter is removed. This system will be based on an autotrophic process for the nitrogen removal, based on the partial nitrification/anammox process. The process itself presents several advantages compared to the conventional nitrification / denitrification process like the reduction of: oxygen consumption (42%), addition of a carbon source (100%), co2 emissions (7%) and sludge production (94%). This application has not been tested at pilot scale yet.
In order to reach the global objective, the research work includes different and multidisciplinary tasks. On the one hand, the design, start-up, operation and monitoring of the biological reactors that ascribe to biotechnological engineering and, on the other hand, the identification of microbial communities present in the granular sludge, which ascribe to microbiology. Furthermore, the obtained experimental results will be used to perform a viability study, which will allow to demonstrate the full scale application of aerobic granular systems.
The main objective of this project aligns with the spanish strategy of science and technology and of innovation with the challenge 5 “action over the climate change and efficiency in the use of resources and raw materials”. This is so because a reduction in the production of greenhouse gases and the production of an effluent with better quality are expected.
Keywords
Waste water;
Water management;
Wastes;
Process efficiency;
Technology;
Marine Region
76
Not associated to marine areas
0
Marine Region Map
