Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

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Journal of Environmental Management

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Review

Pollution control technologies for the treatment of palm oil mill effluent (POME)
through end-of-pipe processes
Ta Yeong Wu a, Abdul Wahab Mohammad b, *, Jamaliah Md. Jahim b, Nurina Anuar b
a
Chemical and Sustainable Process Engineering Research Group, School of Engineering, Monash University, Jalan Lagoon Selatan, Bandar Sunway, 46150,
Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
b
Scale-up and Downstream Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical and Process Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment,
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 UKM Bangi, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Palm oil production is one of the major industries in Malaysia and this country ranks one of the largest
Received 3 July 2008 productions in the world. In Malaysia, the total production of crude palm oil in 2008 was 17,734,441
Received in revised form tonnes. However, the production of this amount of crude palm oil results in even larger amounts of palm
21 January 2010
oil mill effluent (POME). In the year 2008 alone, at least 44 million tonnes of POME was generated in
Accepted 9 February 2010
Available online 15 March 2010
Malaysia. Currently, the ponding system is the most common treatment method for POME but other
processes such as aerobic and anaerobic digestion, physicochemical treatment and membrane filtration
may also provide the palm oil industries with possible insights into the improvement of POME treatment
Keywords:
End-of-pipe process
processes. Generally, open ponding offers low capital and operating costs but this conventional method is
Palm oil mill effluent (POME) becoming less attractive because the methane produced is wasted to the atmosphere and the system can
Ponding system not be certified for Carbon Emission Reduction trading. On the other hand, anaerobic digestion of POME
Aerobic digestion provides the fastest payback of investment because the treatment enables biogas recovery for heat
Anaerobic digestion generation and treated effluent for land application. Lastly, it is proposed herewith that wastewater
Physicochemical treatment management based on the promotion of cleaner production and environmentally sound biotechnologies
Membrane filtration process should be prioritized and included as a part of the POME management in Malaysia for attaining
sustainable development. This paper thus discusses and compares state-of-the-art POME treatment
methods as well as their individual performances.
Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The Malaysian palm oil industry is growing rapidly and quickly
becoming a significant agriculture-based industry in this country.
Table 1 shows that the total productions of crude palm oil in 2008
and 2009 are 17,734,441 and 16,044,874 tonnes, respectively
(MPOB, 2008a, 2009). The high production of crude palm oil
prompts the palm oil industry to become an important contributor
to Malaysia's GDP. Export earnings from palm oil, palm kernel oil
and relating products in 1998 amounted to almost US$5.6 billion,
equivalent to 5.6% of the GDP (Yusoff, 2006). The palm oil industry
provides a source of livelihood to rural families in government land
schemes and private small holders, as well as employment oppor-
tunities to agricultural workers in estates (Khalid and Wan Mustafa,
1992; Ma et al., 1993). In Malaysia, palm oil is even utilized in the
* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ603 89214529; fax: þ603 8921 4660.
E-mail addresses: wu.ta.yeong@eng.monash.edu.my, tayeong@hotmail.com (T.Y.
Wu), wahabm@eng.ukm.my, wahabm@yahoo.com (A.W. Mohammad).
production of biodiesel (palm oil methylester or palm oil diesel) for
buses and cars, and a major expansion of Malaysian diesel
production with 5% palm oil fuel is expected from 2006 (Kalam and
Masjuki, 2002; Reijnders and Huijbregts, 2008).
The progress of the milling and processing sectors has also been
in tandem with the development of oil palm planting. Malaysia has
adopted a wet process for palm oil milling since the dry process,
which is used in certain places in the south of Thailand, is unsuit-
able for use in large-scale productions (Prasertsan and Prasertsan,
1996). The number of palm oil mills in Malaysia has increased
tremendously, i.e. from about 10 mills in 1960 (Ma et al., 1993) to
410 operated mills in 2008 (MPOB, 2008b), in order to meet the
crude palm oil demands both locally and internationally. However,
the production of such large amounts of crude palm oil results in
even larger amounts of palm oil mill effluent (POME) in which case
in the year 2008 alone, at least 44 million tonnes of POME was
generated in Malaysia and the figures are expected to rise every
year. With this alarming figure, the palm oil mill industry in
Malaysia is identified as the one generating the largest pollution
load in rivers throughout the country (Hwang et al., 1978).

0301-4797/$ e see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2010.02.008
1468 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Table 1 of reusing POME as an environmentally sustainable bioresource has

Malaysian production of crude palm oil in 2008 and 2009 (MPOB, 2008a, 2009). not been mentioned in detail in these review papers. Such state-of-
Month 2008 (tonnes) 2009 (tonnes) the-art methods may nonetheless open up a new arena in the
January 1,424,244 1330,195 management of POME and may also provide the palm oil industry
February 1,227,969 1187,381 with a possible insight into better improvement in current POME
March 1,294,710 1275,822 treatment processes. The present paper thus represents a holistic
April 1,327,591 1281,852
review that revisits and updates current treatment methods for
May 1,457,878 1395,275
June 1,468,921 1447,926 POME, and adds more recent, state-of-the-art techniques in order
July 1,560,215 1492,958 to obtain a linking, understanding and appreciation of existing end-
August 1,600,214 1496,073 of-pipe methods for treating POME.
September 1,579,442 1557,764
October 1,652,071 1984,036
November 1,658,417 1595,592 2. Process description and sources of water pollution
December 1,482,769 data not available

Total 17,734,441 16,044,874
Ponding system has been employed by most of the palm oil
mills as their conventional treatment of POME, in which case more
than 85% of the palm oil mills in Malaysia have adopted this
method for POME treatment (Ma et al., 1993). Nevertheless,
ponding system requires long retention times and large treatment
areas because this system usually consists of a de-oiling tank,
acidification, anaerobic and facultative ponds with respective
hydraulic retention times (HRT) of 1, 4, 45 and 16 days (Ma and Ong,
1985). Also, the treated POME using ponding system sometimes
couldn't meet the discharge standard of 50 mg/l BOD (Chin et al.,
1996) and the removal of nitrogen from POME is usually unsatis-
factory because nitrification is an uncommon phenomenon in the
ponding system (John, 1985).
With the rapid expansion of the palm oil industry and the
public's increased awareness of environmental pollution, the
industry is obliged both socially and aesthetically to treat its
effluent before discharging it. In 1977, the Malaysian Government
proposed and legalized standards for POME discharge into water-
courses (Wood, 1977). Since then, palm oil mills are required to
treat their POME prior to discharging it into streams and rivers. The
parameter limits for POME discharge into watercourses in Malaysia
are summarized in Table 2.
Sporadic research has been performed in order to find
approachable solutions for managing POME. The management of
POME has been reviewed before (Agamuthu, 1995; Davis, 1978;
Edewor, 1986; Khalid and Wan Mustafa, 1992; Ma and Ong, 1985,
1986; Ma et al., 1993; Prasertsan and Prasertsan, 1996), with the
main emphasis placed on the current treatment methods, which
are adopted by the palm oil industries. However, numerous treat-
ment techniques performed in laboratory scales and the possibility
The wet palm oil milling process is the most standard and
typical way of extracting palm oil, especially in Malaysia. In large
factories, steam and water are used, thus giving rise to the waste-
water known as POME. The palm oil milling process is more or less
the same for all the mills throughout the country. Fig. 1 shows the
stages involved in the typical processing of crude palm oil. Some
primary palm oil mill processes are explained and summarized in
the following section (Borja and Banks, 1994c; Khalid and Wan
Mustafa, 1992; Ma and Ong, 1985, 1988; Ma et al., 1993; Mahlia
et al., 2001; Prasertsan and Prasertsan, 1996).
2.1. Sterilization
The first step consists in sterilizing the fresh fruit bunches in
steam sterilizers for 50 min at about 140  C and a pressure of
3  105 Pa in order to stop the rapid formation of free fatty acids
during the pulping process. This process also permits the fruits that
are still attached in bunches to be loosened. Under a proper mill
operation and management, the amount of effluent (sterilizer
condensate) is about 0.9 tonnes for each produced tonnes of crude
palm oil. The properties of this effluent are shown in Table 3.
2.2. Stripping, digestion and pressing
The objective of stripping is to separate the sterilized fruits from
the bunch stalks by using a rotary drum thresher. The empty fruit
bunches are then conveyed to the plantation ground as raw fertil-
izers or are incinerated to generate an extra source of energy. After
the bunches have been stripped, the sterilized fruit and the
accompanying calyx leaves must be digested in a heated vessel at
about 80e90  C in order for the mesocarp to be loosened from the
nuts for the subsequent pressing. Then, the homogenous oil mash
from the digesters is pushed through a screw press, and the oil is
thus separated from the spent mesocarp and the nuts.

Table 2
Parameter limits for POME discharge into watercourses in Malaysia (Laws of Malaysia, 1994).

Parametersa Limits according to periods of discharge

1-7-1978e 1-7-1979e 1-7-1980e 1-7-1981e 1-7-1982e 1-1-1984 and

30-6-1979 30-6-1980 30-6-1981 30-6-1982 31-12-1983 thereafter
BOD3b 5000 2000 1000 500 250 100
COD 10,000 4000 2000 1000 e e
Total solids 4000 2500 2000 1500 e e
Suspended solids 1200 800 600 400 400 400
Oil and grease 150 100 75 50 50 50
Ammoniacal nitrogen 25 15 15 10 150c 150c
Total nitrogen 200 100 75 50 300c 200c
pH 5.0e9.0 5.0e9.0 5.0e9.0 5.0e9.0 5.0e9.0 5.0e9.0
Temperature 45 45 45 45 45 45
a
All parameters are in units of mg/l with the exception of pH and temperature ( C).
b
The sample for BOD analysis is incubated at 30  C for 3 days.
c
Value of filtered sample.
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490 1469

Fresh fruit bunches Legend:

Sterilizer
Operation
Sterilization condensate

Stripping Incinerator Product

Empty fruit
bunches
Product
Fruits of POME
Fiber for
boiler fuel
Digestion

Nut/fiber
Oil mash separator
Nuts Nutcracker

Pressing Press cake

Shells and
kernels

Crude oil with

much solids Hydrocyclone
Hydrocylone wastewater

Solids
Decanter

Kernels Shells for

Crude oil with boiler fuel
less solids

Clarification tank

Oil
Sludge

Centrifuge purification
Separator

Vacuum drying

Oil Separator
Dry Oil Storage tank
sludge

Fig. 1. Process operations and products in a typical palm oil extraction process.

2.3. Clarification ‘bottom’ phase since most of it is free or non-dissolved. The

The crude oil extracted from the digested palm fruit by pressing
contains varying amounts of water as well as impurities consisting
of vegetable matter. This matter is in the form of either insoluble
solids or dissolved matter in water. By settling and centrifuging, the
water present in the crude oil can be largely removed from the
‘bottom’ phase of the clarification or settling tank is sent to a sludge
separator or centrifuge where approximately 1.5 tonnes of sludge
waste is obtained per tonnes of produced crude palm oil. The
properties of the sludge are shown in Table 3. The total solids
content of the clarification sludge is much higher than in the other
waste streams (Table 3), which is the result of a higher proportion
1470 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Table 3 Table 4
Characteristics of sterilizer condensate, separator sludge and hydrocyclone waste- The generation of POME, biogas and CH4 in selected FELDA mills in Malaysia (Shirai
water (Whiting, 1978). et al., 2003).

Parametersa Sterilizer Separator Hydrocyclone Palm oil POME Biogas CH4, measured CH4, reported
condensate sludge wastewater mill (m3/ (m3/ value value
pH 5.0 4.5 e month) month) (m3/month) (m3/month)
BOD3b 23,000 29,000 5000 Felda Serting 16,110 451,080 157,878 293,202
COD 47,000 64,000 15,000 Hilir Mill
TSS 5000 23,000 7000 Serting Mill 9550 267,400 93,590 173,810
Total dissolved 34,000 22,000 100 Tementi Mill 5154 144,312 50,509 93,803
solid Keratong 9 Mill 14,000 392,000 137,200 254,800
Total nitrogen 600 1200 100 Keratong 2 Mill 4629 129,612 45,364 84,248
Ammoniacal 20 40 e Keratong 3 Mill 5350 149,800 52,430 97,370
nitrogen Bukit Kepayang 7062 197,736 69,208 128,528
Oil and grease 4000 7000 300 Mill
a Triang Mill 10,258 287,224 100,528 186,696
All parameters are in units of mg/l except pH.
b
The sample for BOD analysis is incubated at 30  C for 3 days.

the palm oil industries. Fig. 2 shows the commencement of a low

of carbohydrate constituents, both soluble and insoluble (Ho et al., crop season as of November 2002, coupled with the year-end public
1984). holidays, was marked by a lower volumetric POME discharge and
thus a decline in the CH4 emission from open digesting tanks in
2.4. Nut and fiber separation Serting Hilir Palm Oil Mill, Negeri Sembilan (Yacob et al., 2005).

During pressing of the digested fruit to extract the oil, a cake

3.2. POME as a source of wastewater
made up of nuts and fiber is produced. The cake is given a prelim-
inary breaking treatment before being fed to the nut/fiber separator
POME, when fresh, is a thick brownish colloidal mixture of
that may bring about separation by mechanical means or by use of
water, oil and fine suspended solids. It is hot (80e90  C) and
an air stream.
possesses a very high BOD3, which is 100 times as polluting as
domestic sewage. The effluent is non-toxic, as no chemicals are
2.5. Kernel extraction and drying
added to the extraction process (Khalid and Wan Mustafa, 1992; Ma
et al., 1993), and also acidic with a pH around 4.5 as it contains
After separation of the fiber from the nuts, the latter are sent for
organic acids in complex forms that are suitable to be used as
further processing from which another product, the palm kernel, is
carbon sources (Md Din et al., 2006). Table 5 shows the general
obtained. This processing section in constituted of a hydrocyclone
characteristics of raw POME (Wood et al., 1979; Wong et al., 2009a).
that separates the kernels from the empty shells after cracking the
The suspended solids or particulate fraction of the effluent
nuts. Approximately 0.1 tonnes of liquid effluent per tonnes of
contribute with less than 50% to the total pollutant level (Ho and
produced crude palm oil is generated in this process. Table 3 shows
Tan, 1983). The particulates, which consist of plant cell debris and
the properties of the hydrocyclone wastewater. Any uncracked nuts
fragments, are entirely organic in nature as indicated by the very
must be removed and recycled, and the shell separated from the
low ash contents (Ho et al., 1984). A simple calculation carried out
kernels.
by Wood (1977) on the mineral contents of POME displays a range
from 2510 to 3850 ppm. The value of 0.421 g/100 ml POME for the
3. Characteristics of POME
total ash obtained by Ho et al. (1984) agreed well with those results.
The lignin-to-cellulose ratio for the particulate fraction of POME is
3.1. General remarks regarding POME
relatively high in comparison with other agricultural fibrous resi-
dues (Jackson, 1977). It is known that ligneous structures within an
POME is a colloidal suspension, originating from the mixture of
organic complex have a tendency to shield the cellulose from
sterilizer condensate, separator sludge and hydrocyclone waste-
enzymatic hydrolysis (Han et al., 1975) and thus attribute a possible
water in a ratio of 9:15:1, respectively. In total, about 2.5e3.0
barrier to the successful biological treatment of POME.
tonnes of POME per tonnes of produced crude palm oil is obtained
in the extraction process (Borja and Banks, 1994c; Ma and Ong,
1985). Table 4 presents the results from a series of interviews
between Shirai et al. (2003) and a few mill managers in Malaysia
with regards to the generation of POME, biogas and methane (CH4)
during a time period of a month.
Normally, the characteristics of POME may vary considerably for
different batches, days and factories, depending on the processing
techniques and the age or type of fruit (Ng et al., 1987) as well as the
discharge limit of the factory, climate and condition of the palm oil
processing (Ahmad et al., 2005f, 2006b). Seasonal oil palm crop-
ping, activities of the palm oil mill (such as occasional public
holidays, closure of the mill, operation and quality control of indi-
vidual mills) will also influence the quality and quantity of the
discharged POME which in turn affect the biological treatment
process of POME (Yacob et al., 2005, 2006a). Thus, the variation of
the characteristics of POME, in terms of its quality and quantity, is Fig. 2. The monthly production of fresh fruit bunches (FBB) and POME in Serting Hilir
the main reason that causes selection in the treatment of POME in Palm Oil Mill (Yacob et al., 2005).
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490 1471

Table 5 particulates fractionated from POME along with other corre-

Characteristics of POME (Wood et al., 1979; Wong et al., 2009a). sponding details are shown in Fig. 3.
Parametera Concentration Element Concentration The oil droplets in POME are well below 8 mm in size and thus
range (mg/l) range (mg/l) very stable, i.e. they will not cream/coalesce under normal
pH 4.15e4.45 Phosphorus 94e131 circumstances (Ho and Tan, 1983; Ho et al., 1984). Only traces of oil
COD 45,500e65,000 Potassium 1281e1928 are found in the soluble fraction of POME whereas the bulk of the
Soluble COD 20,500e24,500 Magnesium 254e344
oil is usually trapped in plant cell debris and unruptured plant cells
BOD 21,500e28,500 Calcium 276e405
Total solid 33,790e37,230 Manganese 2.1e4.4 which, when extracted with hexane, yield approximately 0.673 g
Total volatile solid 27,300e30,150 Iron 75e164 oil/100 ml POME (Ho et al., 1984). It is therefore not surprising that
TSS 15,660e23,560 Zinc 1.2e1.8 up to 50% of oil and grease could be removed when the suspended
Total dissolved 15,500e29,000 Copper 0.8e1.6 solids in the POME were totally eliminated by means of centrifu-
solid
Oil and grease 1077e7582 Chromium 0.05e0.43
gation (Ho and Tan, 1983).
Total nitrogen 500e800 Cobalt 0.04e0.06 In total, the high BOD loading and low pH of POME, together with
Cadmium 0.01e0.02 the colloidal nature of the suspended solids, render treatments by
a
All parameters are in units of mg/l except pH. conventional methods difficult (Olie and Tjeng, 1972; Stanton, 1974).
Consequently, few palm oil mills have adopted policies for effluent
treatment other than ponding, which can lead to substantial losses
in agricultural land as a result of seepage (Webb et al., 1975).
Crystal-like particles that are long and pointed at both ends can
often be found in POME. The occurrence of such crystalline deposits
in various forms is not uncommon in plant cells (Fahn, 1974). The 4. Treatment of POME
acicular crystals are known as raphides and are comprised of
calcium oxalate (Ho and Tan, 1983). Crystals of calcium salts, 4.1. Aerobic digestion or treatment
especially calcium oxalate, have been reported to be the most
common crystals found in many kinds of plant cells (Fahn, 1974). In general, the system using an aerobic digestion for POME
It is well established that plant cell walls are made up of treatment would be more efficient and the HRT even shorter than
microfibrils (Frey-Wyssling, 1976), and during the processing for anaerobic digestion (Agamuthu, 1995). For instance, Karim and
conditions of the fresh palm fruits, it is highly probable that Kamil (1989) found that by using the fungal (Trichoderma viride)
a partial maceration of the walls of these oil-bearing cells into inoculum, a reduction in COD of the POME of more than 95% could
macrofibrils may occur. The chemical nature and the physical be achieved after 10e14 days of fermentation. This finding was in
dimensions of the rod-like particles suggest that these macrofibrils agreement with results from Church et al. (1973) who reported on
actually stem from the cell walls (Ho and Tan, 1983). The the successful use of the fungus T. viride in aerated lagoons and

Fig. 3. The centrifugal fractionation of POME (Wu et al., 2009a).

1472 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Table 6
The performance of an aerobic digestion or treatment.

Treatment processesa Operational conditions Parameters References

COD TSS Oil and grease

Retention Temperature Organic Influent Overall Influent Overall Influent Overall

time ( C) loading (mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction
(day) rate (%) (%) (%)
(g COD/l
day)

Pressurized activated 0.417 30e35 0.4e0.65d 9210 97.7 3510 99.2 325 93.3 Ho and Tan
sludge processb (1988)
Aerobic treatment with 5% inoculum of 14 28 e e >95 e e e e Karim and
Trichoderma viride spores Kamil (1989)
Aerobic treatment with 5% inoculum of 10 28 e e >95 e e e e Karim and
T. viride mycelium Kamil (1989)
Aerobic treatment with single culture of 7 30 e e 92 e e e 87.7 Bhumibhamon
KUL8 (Acinetobacter sp.) et al. (2002)
Aerobic treatment with mixed culture 7 30 e e z91 e e e z60 Bhumibhamon
et al. (2002)
Aerobic treatment with Yarrowia lipolytica 2 30 e 243,000 96.9 e e e e Oswal et al.
(2002)
Aerobic treatment with Y. lipolytica þ 0.03 g/L 6 30 e 246,000 99.4 e e e e Oswal et al.
FeCl3 þ consortium developed from (2002)
garden soil
Rotating biological contactor with 2.29 e e e 88e e 89f e e Najafpour et al.
Saccharomyces cerevisiaec (2005)
Activated sludge reactorb 2.5 e e 3908 98 e e 237 90 Vijayaraghavan
et al. (2007)
c
Activated sludge reactor 2.5 e e 3925 89 e e 558 80 Vijayaraghavan
et al. (2007)
a
Unless otherwise stated, all the treatment processes are used to treat raw POME.
b
Anaerobically digested POME is treated.
c
Diluted raw POME is treated.
d
The organic loading rate is in the unit of kg BOD/kg MLSS day.
e
The COD removal is the result of COD surface loading rate of 38 g COD/m2 day.
f
The TSS removal is the result of solid loading rate of 14 g TSS/m2 day.

oxidation ditches for the treatment of corn and pea canning wastes.
Thus, a COD removal in the wastes of more than 95% could be
achieved in much shorter HRTs than in usual anaerobic digestion. T.
viride was able to grow well and compete against the indigenous
flora in the raw POME with a yield of 1.37e1.42 g/l (dry weight)
mycelium and a 37.6e40.7% crude protein (Karim and Kamil, 1989).
Oswal et al. (2002) found that POME treatment using Yarrowia
lipolytica NCIM 3589, which is known to degrade alkanes in crude
oil (Zinjarde and Pant, 2000), provided a COD reduction of about
95% with a retention time as short as 2 days. An even higher
reduction of COD could further be achieved when a POME treated
with Yarrowia was sequentially treated with a flocculant and ulti-
mately with a consortium developed from garden soil. In the
treatment of oil and grease in POME, Bhumibhamon et al. (2002)
found that it was more suitable to utilize single cultures of Acine-
tobacter sp. (KUL8), Bacillus sp. (KUL39) and Pseudomonas sp.
(KLB1) rather than a mixed culture. The lipases produced by mixed
cultures could catalyze either the hydrolysis reaction or the trans-
esterification reaction, depending on the source of lipase and the
reaction conditions (Bhumibhamon et al., 2002; Macrae, 1983).
Moreover, the mixed culture also produced protease, which might
lower the lipase and degradation activities (Bhumibhamon et al.,
2002).
Najafpour et al. (2005) used the continuous bench scale of
a rotating biological contactor (RBC) to treat POME. An RBC retains
a very high biomass and therefore has the capacity to treat
wastewater of high strength. It also tolerates high organic loadings
and hydraulic shocks in which case the disc biomass is able to play
a major role in the organic biodegradation (Boshou and Hartmann,
1992; Najafpour et al., 2002). According to Najafpour et al. (2005),
with an initial biomass loading and by fixing a biofilm of Saccha-
romyces cerevisiae on the surface of the RBC, it was possible to
significantly remove about 88% COD, 89% suspended solids and 80%
total Kjeldahl nitrogen with the lowest volumetric flow rate of 1.1 l/
h of POME at an HRT of 55 h.
Vijayaraghavan et al. (2007) investigated the treatment of POME
using aerobic oxidation based on an activated sludge process. They
found that the removal of COD as well as oil and grease by aerobic
oxidation was higher in anaerobically digested POME as compared
to in diluted raw POME at an HRT of 60 h. A possible reason for the
increased removal of organic matter as well as oil and grease in the
anaerobically digested sample was believed to be the presence of
partially degraded organic and oil molecules, making them more
amenable to aerobic digestion. Recently, Damayanti et al. (2010)
used respirometric test to estimate model parameters for acti-
vated sludge modeling of POME in a continuous stirred tank
reactor. They found that the mass transfer coefficient is 0.3 h1
during lag and start feed phase and 0.01 h1 during stop feed phase,
while the heterotrophic yield coefficient is 0.44. These coefficients
could serve as a basis for design and optimization of a POME
treatment process.
Ho and Tan (1988) used a pressurized activated sludge process
in the secondary treatment of anaerobically digested POME liquor
for obtaining a high rate of oxygen transfer at an elevated pressure
in the reactor. By keeping the ratio of nutrients to mixed liquor
suspended solids (MLSS) between 0.4 and 0.7 kg BOD/kg MLSS per
day in the pressurized reactor, it was possible to achieve reductions
in BOD, COD, total solids, suspended solids (or biomass) and oil
(and grease) of up to 98.4%, 97.7%, 87.5%, 99.2% and 93.3%,
respectively. The superiority of the pressurized system over the
conventional method depends solely on its higher level of dissolved
oxygen and larger constants of the oxygen transfer rate.
It is not unusual to encounter an increase in the total concen-
tration of organic nitrogen as well as a decrease in the
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
concentrations of ammonia nitrogen and nitrate nitrogen with time
in all aerobic pretreatments of POME. A possible explanation is the
presence of aerobic non-symbiotic N-fixers such as Azotobacter,
Beijerinckia and Bacillus species and also the utilization of ammonia
nitrogen and nitrate nitrogen for growth of the microflora in POME
(Agamuthu et al., 1986). A decrease in the ammonia nitrogen
concentration was also observed in municipal waste by Chopp et al.
(1982) as well as in sewage sludge treated alone or with soil by
Premi and Cornfield (1969). The performance of an aerobic diges-
tion or treatment is summarized in Table 6.
4.2. Anaerobic digestion or treatment
Anaerobic digestion is the most suitable method for the treat-
ment of effluents containing high concentration of organic carbon
(Perez et al., 2001) such as POME. Furthermore, anaerobic digestion
has been proven to be unique and the most beneficial stabilization
technique as it optimizes cost effectiveness, is environmentally
sound, minimizes the amount of final sludge disposal and has the
ability to produce a net energy gain in the form of CH4 (De Baere,
2000). The suggested anaerobic treatment processes for POME
include anaerobic suspended growth processes, attached growth
anaerobic processes (immobilized cell bioreactors, anaerobic
fluidized bed reactors and anaerobic filters), anaerobic sludge
blanket processes (up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket reactors and
anaerobic baffled reactors), membrane separation anaerobic
treatment processes and hybrid anaerobic treatment processes.
Table 7 shows the performance of anaerobic digestion or treatment
under both mesophilic and thermophilic conditions.
4.2.1. Anaerobic suspended growth processes
Early applications of anaerobic treatments of industrial waste-
waters consisted in suspended growth processes, which were
initially similarly designed to anaerobic sludge digesters (Metcalf
and Eddy, Inc., 2003). In Malaysia, anaerobic digesters employed
in the treatment of POME can be operated either as open tank
digesters with an extended aeration system (Fig. 4) or as closed
tank digesters with biogas recovery and land application (Fig. 5).
In an open tank digester system, POME is treated in a two-phase
anaerobic digestion process followed by extended aeration in
a pond. The digester (600e1300 m3) remains open at the top and is
unstirred. The HRTs for the acidification, anaerobic and aerobic
processes are 1, 20 and 20 days, respectively, and the organic
loading of an open tank digester is in the range of 0.8e1.0 kg BOD/
m3 per day (Khalid and Wan Mustafa, 1992). On the other hand,
a closed tank digester (1500e4200 m3) is operated as a conven-
tional high rate system with an organic loading of 4.8 kg volatile
solids/m3 per day. The HRT is approximately 10 days, for operation
at 42e50  C.
The extended aeration is very efficient in the removal of
nitrogen, particularly the ammoniacal nitrogen. However, the
nitrogen may have been converted to nitrate (nitrification) or
driven off the system as ammonia gas (Ma and Ong, 1985). Ugoji
(1997) found that a tank digester with a certain degree of mixing
could enhance the efficiency of COD removal after 10 days of HRT.
However, only a slight increase in the efficiency of COD removal
was observed for the following 15 and 20 days of HRT. Cail and
Barford (1985b) also applied a brief mixing of 40e50 rpm after
feeding in their semi-continuous reactor in order to ease the
contact between substrate and organisms.
In open tank digester system, Yacob et al. (2005) reported that
for every tonne of treated POME, an average of 5.5 kg of CH4 (or
approximately 36% of biogas) is emitted from open digesting tanks.
This value is significantly lower than what was reported by Ma et al.
(1999), i.e. 65%. In total, an average of 5.4 l/min m2 biogas was
1473
recorded and the total CH4 emission per open digesting tank was
518.9 kg/day. The lower CH4 composition was largely attributed to
the lack of operational control and a high tendency of O2 contam-
ination in the open digesting tanks, thereby reducing the anaerobic
degradation efficiency. Fig. 6 indicates future trends in CH4 emis-
sion estimated from past crude palm oil production values and
predictions of the future. The figure shows that 0.33 million tonnes
of CH4 is expected to be emitted from open tank digesters in 2020
(Shirai et al., 2003).
Edewor (1986) attempted to review and assess the practical
value of various methods that could be used to recover the biogas or
fertilizer from POME. He suggested that the tank digester mode was
the optimal method for an anaerobic treatment of POME, as
compared to the ponding system. This is due to the digester method
being able to produce an average of 2.38 m3 of biogas for every m3
of effective digester tank volume treated each day. Moreover, the
resulting treated sludge is fed directly to the palm tree as fertilizer.
To ensure the stability of a designed process in an aerobic
digester, the retention times should be high, which in turn leads to
higher capital and operating costs. To reduce these effects, a two-
phase anaerobic digestion system using two reactors (acid-phase
and methane-phase digesters), arranged in series, was introduced
by Ng et al. (1985). They indicated that phase-separation through
the manipulation of retention times was more feasible for the
anaerobic digestion of POME, in comparison with dialysis tech-
niques (Hammer and Borchardt, 1966; Schaumberg and Kirsch,
1966) and addition of inhibitors (Pohland and Mancy, 1969).
A proper start-up operation of a closed digester is a very
important aspect in ensuring a good performance of the treatment
process. Yacob et al. (2006b) created an active microbial population
in their start-up strategy by using seed sludge from the same type
of waste and hence reducing the acclimatization period as well as
the HRT, as compared to the existing open digester which operates
at an HRT of 20 days (Yacob et al., 2005). According to Tabatabaei
et al. (2009), Methanosaeta concilii is the most abundant metha-
nogen in POME anaerobic digestion and that it plays an important
role in CH4 production from acetate and the optimum condition for
its growth should be considered when an attempt is made to treat
POME anaerobically. The stability of closed anaerobic digester could
be improved if a setting tank was installed and the sludge was
recycled as to provide a balanced microorganisms population for
the treatment of POME and CH4 gas production. In order to avoid
the process turning acidic and inhibiting the methanogenesis
process, higher sludge recycling rate was applied at 12 m3/day
(Sulaiman et al., 2009).
Normally, the anaerobic suspended growth digester for POME
treatment is operated under mesophilic condition (below 45  C)
(Borja et al., 1995; Cail and Barford, 1985a; Ma and Ong, 1988; Ng
et al., 1985; Yacob et al., 2006b). Thermophilic anaerobic diges-
tion of POME has been tried previously (Borja-Padilla and Banks,
1993; Cail and Barford, 1985b; Chin and Wong, 1983; Ibrahim
et al., 1985; Yeoh, 1986) since it would be advantageous to carry
out the anaerobic digestion under thermophilic conditions within
the temperature range of 49e57  C (McCarty, 1964) with the POME
temperature varying between 45 and 70  C. It is generally recog-
nized that thermophilic operation has the potential for a faster
bacterial growth and consequently higher treatment rates. For
example, by operating the digester under thermophilic conditions
(Cail and Barford, 1985b), the rate was four times faster than that
achieved by Cail and Barford (1985a) when a similar digester was
operated at 35  C.
According to Peyton et al. (1979), despite that more COD was
removed in a thermophilic system (8-day HRT) than in a mesophilic
digester (20-day HRT), a larger amount of soluble BOD remained in
the settled effluent. The authors assumed that this was due to the
1474 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Table 7
The performance of an anaerobic digestion or treatment.

Treatment processesa Operational conditions Parameters References

Retention Temperature Organic COD TSS Oil and grease

time ( C) loading
Influent Overall Influent Overall Influent Overall
(day) rate
(mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction
(g COD/l
(%) (%) (%)
day)
Anaerobic suspended growth processes
Completed mixed reactors 35 55 e 67,000 95.6 31,800 81.8 e e Chin and Wong
(1983)
Semi-continuous digester 5.6 35 12.6 70,000 75 e e e e Cail and Barford
(1985a)
Semi-continuous digester e 57 33 70,000 74 e e e e Cail and Barford
(1985b)
Semi-continuous digester e 57 41 70,000 62 e e e e Cail and Barford
(1985b)
e e
Digestion tank 5.9 45 3.11 e 92.6 e e e e Ibrahim et al.
(1985)
Digestion tank 4.7 50 3.44e e 93.3e e e e e Ibrahim et al.
(1985)
Two-phase anaerobic digesters
(acid- þ methane-phase) (1 þ 10) 32 e 62,934 78 26,456 52 e e Ng et al. (1985)
Two-phase anaerobic digesters
(acid- þ methane-phase) (1 þ 30) 32 e 62,934 85 26,456 69 e e Ng et al. (1985)
Tank digester 10 e e 54,510 93.6 e e e e Edewor (1986)
Tank digester 30 e e 54,510 97.7 e e e e Edewor (1986)
Anaerobic digesterb 15e16 27e30 1.8e 26,150e 91e e e e e Ma and Ong
(1988)
Semi-continuous digester 4.3 55 15.1 65,000 85 e e e e Borja-Padilla
and Banks
(1993)
Completely mixed reactors 50.0 35 e 48,200 83.4 e e e e Borja et al.
(1995)
Completely mixed reactorsb 8.3 35 e 5800 96.6 e e e e Borja et al.
(1995)
Tank digester with certain degree of mixing 30 e e 83,570 97.7 e e e e Ugoji (1997)
Open digesting tank 20 e e 43,288 80.7 e e e e Yacob et al.
(2005)
Semi-commercial closed anaerobic digester 17 37e42 <5 e >95 e e e e Yacob et al.
(2006b)
Attached growth anaerobic processes
Immobilized cell bioreactor 6.2 e e 69,000 96.2 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1994b)
c
Immobilized cell bioreactor 6.2 e e 17,250 90.7 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1994b)
Upflow anaerobic filter 6 35 11.4 69,000 91 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1994c)
Upflow anaerobic filterc 15 35 1.2 19,500 93 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1994c)
Anaerobic filterc 1 35 10 10,000 98.5 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1995)
c
Anaerobic filter 1 35 20 20,000 85.0 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1995)
Anaerobic fluidized bed reactorc 0.5 35 10 5000 93.0 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1995)
Anaerobic fluidized bed reactorc 0.25 35 40 10,000 78.0 e e e e Borja and Banks
(1995)
c
Upflow anaerobic contact filter 3 e e 20,000 48 e e e e Vijayaraghavan
and Ahmad
(2006)
Upflow anaerobic contact filterc 7 e e 20,000 73 e e e e Vijayaraghavan
and Ahmad
(2006)
Anaerobic sludge blanket processes
One-stage up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket 4 35 10.6 42,500 96 e e e e Borja and Banks
reactor (1994a)
Two-stage up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket e 35 30 e >90 e e e e Borja et al.
reactorsc (1996b)
Two-stage up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket e 35 60 e <80 e e e e Borja et al.
reactorsc (1996b)
Anaerobic baffled reactord 2.5 35 10.85 24,849 84.6 3417 62.5 2200 72.7 Setiadi et al.
(1996)
Modified anaerobic baffled reactor 10 e 1.60 16,000 95.3 e e 410 91.3 Faisal and Unno
(2001)
Expanded granular sludge bed reactor 2 35 17.5 5000e35,000 91 e e e e Zhang et al.
(2008a)
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490 1475

Table 7 (continued )

Treatment processesa Operational conditions Parameters References

Retention Temperature Organic COD TSS Oil and grease

time ( C) loading
Influent Overall Influent Overall Influent Overall
(day) rate
(mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction (mg/l) reduction
(g COD/l
(%) (%) (%)
day)
Membrane separation anaerobic
treatment process
Membrane anaerobic system 3.15 35 21.7 68,310 92.1 e e e e Fakhru'l-Razi
and Noor
(1999)
Hybrid anaerobic treatment process
Anaerobic hybrid digester 3.5 e 16.2 56,700 92.3 e e e e Borja et al.
(1996a)
Upflow anaerobic sludge fixed film reactorc 1.5 38 23.15 34,725 89.5 e e e e Najafpour et al.
(2006)
Optimized up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film 1.5 38 9.3 13,880 92.62 e e e e Zinatizadeh
reactord (POME was pre-treated via et al. (2006a,
coagulation and flocculation) 2007a)
Upflow anaerobic sludge fixed film reactorc 1 38 34.73 34,725 80.6 e e e e Zinatizadeh
et al. (2006b)
Optimized up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film 2.2 38 12.9 28,640 95.1 e e e e Zinatizadeh
reactord (POME was pre-treated via et al. (2007a)
sedimentation)
a
Unless otherwise stated, all the treatment processes are used to treat raw POME.
b
Sterilizer condensate is treated.
c
Diluted POME is treated.
d
Pretreated POME is treated.
e
BOD loading rate (g BOD/l day), BOD (mg/l) and BOD reduction (%) are used.

increased liberation of cell components, such as oils, which were
not degraded at the shorter HRT. However, this explanation would
appear unlikely, as mentioned by Cail and Barford (1985b), since
soluble COD removal efficiencies in POME remained very high. Chin
and Wong (1983) found that the addition of nitrogen and phos-
phorous in the POME for thermophilic digestion was considered
unessential even for start-up operations. This despite that Blaak
(1981) reported that the addition of 27 mg nitrogen and 13.5 mg
P2O5/g bacteria dried solids were essential for the anaerobic
digestion of POME in order to stimulate CH4 production. It was
found by Ibrahim et al. (1985) that in the 50  C digester, only about
10e100 sulphate-reducing bacteria/ml were detectable whereas in
the digester operating at 30  C, a count of between 3  104 and
4  104 sulphate-reducing bacteria/ml was observed (Toerien et al.,
1968). This finding has an important implication on the utilization
of biogas for generating electricity through gas engine systems
where low concentrations of the highly corrosive H2S in biogas are
desirable.
The potential disadvantage of thermophilic digestion of POME
has been pointed out by Ibrahim et al. (1985). They experienced an
extensive carry-over of scum (due to the presence of oil and grease
in the raw effluent) into the gas outlet at high loading rates. Similar
observations were also encountered by Borja-Padilla and Banks
(1993), in which case a further increase in loading rates (more
than 15.1 kg COD/m3) increased the risk of blockages and sludge
flotation caused by a combination of high concentrations of sus-
pended solids in the digesters and the rapid gas production.
Sometimes, a higher temperature is totally unnecessary in the
treatment of POME. For example, POME from sterilizer condensate
could be easily treated by an anaerobic process at the ambient
temperature of 27e30  C, without adjustment of either the pH or
nutrients (Ma and Ong, 1988). The underlying explanation is
believed to be that the sterilizer condensate is more easily digest-
ible than the mixed POME since the organic substrates in the
sterilizer condensate are mostly in solution.

Fig. 4. The anaerobic contact and aeration process; FD ¼ final aerobic discharge, An S ¼ anaerobic sludge, Ae S ¼ aerobic sludge (Ma and Ong, 1985).
1476 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
Fig. 5. A schematic diagram of an anaerobic tank and land application system (Ma and Ong, 1985).
4.2.2. Attached growth anaerobic processes
Borja and Banks (1994b) have reported on the use of
immobilized-cell reactors for treating POME. In this type of biore-
actor, the bacteria colonize material particles, allowing their
retention at high biomass densities. These reactors can cope with
high volumetric loads, which make them suitable for treating
wastewaters with either high or low organic strengths, such as
POME. In addition, the nature of the support material colonized by
the bacteria is important, a fact that has been emphasized by
several researchers (Fiestas et al., 1990; Huysman et al., 1983; Kida
et al., 1990; Murray and Van den Berg, 1981). The support material
influences the production and composition of the biogas as well as
the proportions in which the different types of microorganisms
develop (Maestrojuan et al., 1986). Furthermore, it has previously
been unnecessary to dilute POME in order to obtain a high effi-
ciency of COD removal. The average biodegradable substrate was
found to be 95.7% of the influent showing the efficiency of anaer-
obic digestion when saponite (0.4e0.8 mm diameter) was
employed as the support medium. This value is considerably higher
than in other reports (Chin, 1981; Edewor, 1986; Ibrahim et al.,
1985; Ng et al., 1985).
An anaerobic filter is another type of attach growth anaerobic
process that has been tried in laboratory scale for the treatment of
POME (Borja and Banks, 1994c, 1995; Mustapha et al., 2003;
Vijayaraghavan and Ahmad, 2006). The anaerobic filter presents
several important characteristics (Russo et al., 1985; Young and
McCarty, 1969) that have proven extremely useful for treating
POME-type effluents. Borja and Banks (1994c) observed that all
substrate in the POME could be removed within the first 0.4 m,
which corresponded to merely 21% of the filter height. Jennet and
Dennis (1975) and Russo et al. (1985), working respectively with
pharmaceutical wastes and distillery wastewater, reported similar
Fig. 6. Estimation of methane release from both lagoon and open digesting system
(Shirai et al., 2003).
results. These findings indicated a sequential removal of substrate
within the reactor. Mustapha et al. (2003) designed a start-up
process in a relatively short period of time for a thermophilic up-
flow anaerobic filter. The start-up strategy was accomplished over
a sequential increase in temperature at 0.5e1.0  C per day, during
which the mesophilic bacterial seed was gradually acclimatized to
the thermophilic conditions (55  C). Microflora, which was isolated
from cow dung, was used in the anaerobic contact filter treatment
of POME (Vijayaraghavan and Ahmad, 2006). Their results dis-
played that a maximum COD removal was obtained at pH 5. A
possible reason for the low COD removal efficiency at lower pH was
the change in metabolic reaction, resulting in a shift in the inter-
mediate production pathway from the acid production phase to the
solvent production phase (Byung and Zeikus, 1985; Khanal et al.,
2004).
The attached growth anaerobic fluidized bed reactor is similar in
physical design to the up-flow expanded bed reactor with the
exception that it is operated at higher up-flow liquid velocities
(approximately 20 m/h) in order to provide a bed expansion of
almost 100% (Metcalf and Eddy, Inc., 2003). Borja and Banks (1995)
compared an anaerobic filter to an anaerobic fluidized bed reactor
with respect to POME treatment. They found that the fluidized bed
reactor provided a superior performance to the anaerobic filter at
higher loadings, in which case the anaerobic filter could not be
operated above 20 g COD/l day without clogging. Shorter HRT (6 h)
and better CH4 production also proved to be an advantage of
fluidized bed over anaerobic filter (1.5e4.5 days) in POME treat-
ment (Poh and Chong, 2009).
4.2.3. Anaerobic sludge blanket processes
Two major types of anaerobic sludge blanket processes, namely
the original up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) process
(Borja and Banks, 1994a; Borja et al., 1996b) and the anaerobic
baffled reactor (ABR) (Faisal and Unno, 2001; Setiadi and Faisal,
1994; Setiadi et al., 1996), have been essayed for POME treatment.
Granular sludge formation is the main distinguishing characteris-
tics of UASB reactors as compared to other anaerobic technologies.
In spite of the advantages of granular sludge, effective treatments of
wastewater with flocculant sludge UASB reactors have been docu-
mented (Goodwin et al., 2001; Sayed et al., 1984).
Borja et al. (1996b) applied the principal of a two-stage treat-
ment using a pair of up-flow anaerobic reactors, namely acidogenic
and methanogenic UASB reactors, to treat POME and evaluate the
effect of a staged treatment on a sludge granulation. They found
that loadings as high as 60 g COD/l per day resulted in a significant
decrease in COD removal efficiency as well as in carbon flow from
long-chain fatty acids to CH4. Nonetheless, a maximum load of
around 30 g COD/l per day should ensure a highly effective
reduction in COD and an efficient acid conversion to CH4. Perfor-
mance in UASB could be improved with addition of certain trace
metal, showing that trace metals are necessary for the activation of
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
key enzymes for methanogenesis and lack of sufficient trace metals
may result an accumulation of volatile fatty acid during POME
treatment (Zhang et al., 2008a).
The effects of a staged treatment on a sludge granulation in
UASB reactors for treating POME are noteworthy. The process of
granulation under acidogenic conditions is far less studied than in
mixed digestion although it has been reported on by a number of
authors (Cohen and Zoetemeyer, 1979; Lettinga et al., 1980). Borja
et al. (1996b) observed that the acidogenic granules were much
more fragile, appeared less dense and had a considerably lower
settling velocity as well as an offensive odor. Moreover, the granules
were devoid of multicellular filaments and appeared to be bound
together by chains of large rod-shaped bacteria. The surfaces of the
granules consisted predominantly of short plump rods and various
coccus types. The methanogenic granules in UASB reactors treating
POME (Borja et al., 1996b) were similar to those previously reported
in UASB reactors treating wastewaters from food industry
(Dinopoulou and Sterrit, 1988; Dolfing et al., 1986; Goodwin et al.,
1992; Wiegant and Lettinga, 1985). In this latter case, the gran-
ules consisted of networks of long multicellular filaments, typical of
Methanothrix spp., with a diverse selection of rod and coccus type
bacteria trapped in a dense matrix.
A number of studies have been carried out with the ABR process
on bench and pilot scales for a wide range of water-soluble wastes
(Bachmann et al., 1985), including POME (Faisal and Unno, 2001;
Setiadi and Faisal, 1994; Setiadi et al., 1996). Setiadi et al. (1996)
reported that in the treatment of POME by ABR, a recycling of
more than 15 times was required to maintain the pH of the system
higher than 6.8 without alkalinity supplementation. This imposed
recycling was an effective means of reducing alkalinity require-
ments and inhibiting methanogenic microorganisms. Without
sufficient recycling, about 9 g NaOH was needed per liter POME to
maintain the stability of the system at pH  6.8. The exact amount
differs with regard to the waste type, but usually ranges from 0.1 to
1.6 mg alkalinity (as CaCO3)/mg influent COD (Moosbrugger et al.,
1993). The need for recycling in order to maintain the reactor
stability was suggested by Sam-Soon et al. (1991), and was
considered especially important for strong wastes like POME. The
highest recycle ratio of 25 allowed a high removal of COD as well as
of oil and grease up to 72.7% at the COD loading rate of 10.9 g/l per
day (Setiadi et al., 1996). Certain existing ABR designs, proposed by
Bachmann et al. (1985), have been modified by Faisal and Unno
(2001). The authors concluded that modified ABR could maintain
the methanogens active by keeping the volatile fatty acid concen-
tration low (608 mg/l), especially at longer HRTs (10 days), thus
leading to a high removal of COD as well as to a reduction of grease/
oil and of the total organic carbon up to 91.3% and 95.9%,
respectively.
4.2.4. Membrane separation anaerobic treatment process
Membrane separation has been considered for anaerobic reac-
tors but the technology is still in a development stage. Several
studies on membrane anaerobic processes for the treatment of
various wastewaters including POME (Fakhru'l-Razi and Noor,
1999) have been performed (Fakhru'l-Razi, 1994; Nagano et al.,
1992; Pillay et al., 1994; Ross et al., 1992; Strohwald and Ross,
1992). For example, an ultrafiltration (UF) membrane with
a molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) of 200,000 was used by
Fakhru'l-Razi and Noor (1999) for biomass/effluent separation in
conjunction with an anaerobic process for the treatment of POME.
A lower operating pressure (1.5 bar) but a higher crossflow velocity
(2.3 m/s) was applied in this study in order to control fouling and to
reduce solid deposition on the membrane surfaces. A high COD
removal could be obtained in the membrane anaerobic system
(MAS), but the permeate displayed a high color content with a low
1477
turbidity (less than 10 NTU), indicating that the color was due to
dissolved solids with molecular weights lower than 200,000 g/mol.
The particulate organics retained in the reactor could be liquefied
and decomposed because of the long solid retention time, which
was independent of the HRT. The HRT was mainly influenced by the
UF membrane flux rates which directly determined the volume of
influent that could be fed to the reactor.
4.2.5. Hybrid anaerobic treatment processes
In recent years, the interest in anaerobic hybrid technologies,
namely the combination of different anaerobic systems into a single
bioreactor, has displayed a large growth since it couples the
recovery of usable energy with good process efficiency and
stability. The up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film (UASFF) reactor,
which is an anaerobic hybrid reactor, is a combination of a UASB
reactor and an immobilized cell or fixed film reactor. The UASFF can
overcome the existing deficiencies faced by an original UASB
reactor. For example, the granulation of anaerobic sludge, which
usually requires a longer time (Schmidt and Ahring, 1996), was
observed within the limited operational period in the UASFF reactor
since the internal recirculation of dispersed bacteria and the
resultant high interaction among bacterial consortium could assist
in their faster agglomeration to form biogranules (Najafpour et al.,
2006). The UASFF reactor has been successfully used for treating
various wastewaters such as swine (Lo et al., 1994), POME (Borja
et al., 1996a; Najafpour et al., 2006; Zinatizadeh et al., 2006a,b,
2007a,b) and slaughterhouse wastewater (Borja et al., 1998).
The UASFF reactor has been shown to be highly efficient in the
treatment of POME although at lower HRT. The best option to
achieve high solid retention time while maintaining HRT at low
levels is biomass immobilization, which is applied in the UASFF
reactor in the form of granular sludge and biofilm attached on the
packing (Zinatizadeh et al., 2007b). Borja et al. (1996a) used an
anaerobic hybrid digester, in which the bottom two-thirds were
occupied by a sludge blanket and the upper one-third by
submerged PVC rings, to treat POME under mesophilic conditions.
A high COD removal could be achieved at an HRT of 3.5 days,
however, a decreasing digester efficiency was observed along with
accumulation of propionic acid. Najafpour et al. (2006) were able to
shorten the start-up period to 26 days in a UASFF reactor obtaining
a removal efficiency of 85% at 23.15 g COD/l per day. This can be
compared with a study carried out by Borja and Banks (1994a)
concerning a UASB reactor where a COD removal efficiency of
more than 90% at 1.27 g COD/l per day was achieved after a longer
start-up period, i.e. 30 days. Najafpour et al. (2006) and Zinatizadeh
et al. (2006b) also concluded that a high COD removal could be
obtained at a low HRT in a UASFF reactor. The complete digestion of
raw POME without pre-treatment demanded a high HRT, which
was not easily obtained due to the high volume of POME production
by most factories (Zinatizadeh et al., 2006a, 2007a).
A higher COD removal could be achieved with a shorter HRT
when the raw POME was pre-treated physically (sedimentation) or
chemically (chemical coagulation and flocculation) prior to the
anaerobic treatment in the UASFF reactor (Zinatizadeh et al.,
2007a). Zinatizadeh et al. (2007a) noted that the chemical pre-
treatment approach was more predictable, reliable and practical
as the sludge produced was readily compressible and thus easier to
separate as opposed to in the physical pre-treatment approach.
The internal packing and the high ratio of effluent recycling
were understood to be the two main factors controlling the stability
of the UASFF reactor at high organic loadings (Najafpour et al.,
2006). On the other hand, Zinatizadeh et al. (2006a) stated that
the anaerobic digestion in up-flow reactors also depended on the
feed flow rate, the up-flow velocity, the influent COD concentration,
the alkalinity and the biomass concentration, with the most critical
1478 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Table 8
The performance of a physicochemical treatment process.

Treatment processesa Operational Parameters References

conditions

Temperature pH COD TSS Oil and grease

( C)
Influent Overall Influent Overall Influent Overall
(mg/l) reduction (%) (mg/l) reduction (%) (mg/l) reduction (%)
Sedimentation and centrifugation
Sedimentation for 30 minb 25 5.0 12,000 43 5090 61 e e Karim and Hie (1987)
Centrifugation at 10,000g for 60 min 5 e 43,000 40 25,300 100 8500 50 Ho and Tan (1983)
Centrifugationc e e 1336 30 657 86 e e Wong et al. (2002b)
Coagulation and flocculation
0.1 g/L Magnafloc LT22 polymerb 25 5.0 13,400 63 5310 94 e e Karim and Hie (1987)
0.1 g/L Magnafloc LT22 polymer þ 25 5.0 12,000 49 5090 92 Karim and Hie (1987)
0.3 g/L FeCl3b
0.05 g/L Zetag-92 polymer 30 3.56 57,000 z62 22,000 97 e e Ng et al. (1987)
0.03 g/L Zetag-92 polymer 30 3.56 e e 22,000 84 e e Ng et al. (1987)
0.03 g/L Zetag-92 polymer 70 3.56 e e 22,000 98 e e Ng et al. (1987)
0.032 g/L synthesized polyacrylamides e 3 z65,950 54 z28,250 98.7 e e Ariffin et al. (2005)
(485 C/g)
1.445% (v/v) Envifloc 40L alum þ 0.029% RTd 6 50,000 85.0 59,350 99.9 2000 95.0 Ahmad et al. (2005b)
(v/v) Profloc CX822 flocculant þ activated
carbon
0.5 g/L chitosan powder 26e30 4.5 e e 990 (1:10) 98 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2006b)
8 g/L alum 26e30 4.5 e e 990 (1:10) 89 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2006b)
6 g/L polyaluminum chloride 26e30 4.5 e e 990 (1:10) 93 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2006b)
3.469 g/L MOAE þ 6.736 g/L flocculant NALCO e 5 e e 17,927 99.0 e e Bhatia et al. (2007a)
7751 (optimized conditions)
6 g/L alum 30 5 40,200 66 17,927 89 e e Bhatia et al. (2007b)
6 g/L MOAEe 30 5 40,200 52.2 17,927 95 e e Bhatia et al. (2007b)
4 g/L MOAE þ 7 g/L flocculant NALCO 7751 30 5 40,200 52.5 17,927 99.3 2658 98.9 Bhatia et al. (2007b)
4 g/L MOAE þ 7 g/L flocculant NALCO 7751 70 5 40,200 z42 17,927 z98 e e Bhatia et al. (2007b)
Electrocoagulation e e 36,800 30 e e e e Agustin et al. (2008)
Single polymer system RT e 38,000 53.68 14,800 99.60 3700 99.60 Ahmad et al. (2008)
Dual polymer system RT e 38,000 55.79 14,800 99.66 3700 99.66 Ahmad et al. (2008)
Floatation
Electroflotation for 3 h e 4 50,600 30 e e e e Ho and Chan (1986)
Electroflotation for 3 h e 10 50,600 50 e e e e Ho and Chan (1986)
Dissolved air floatation 29e31 e 22,000 80f
f
34,000 90 e e Ng et al. (1988)
Dissolved air floatation c e e 9870 79.2 3570 94.4 e e Ho and Tan (1989)
Dissolved air floatation after chemical e e 9870 94.7 3570 97.0 e e Ho and Tan (1989)
flocculation c,g
Colloidal gas aphrons (LUX flakes) b 30 5.0 e e 5000 96 e e Subramaniam et al.
(1990)
b
Colloidal gas aphrons (LUX flakes) 30 5.0 e e 7500 92 e e Subramaniam et al.
(1990)
b
Colloidal gas aphrons (LUX flakes) 70 5.0 e e 5000 z60 e e Subramaniam et al.
(1990)
Colloidal gas aphrons (LUX flakes) þ 0.05 g/L 30 5.0 e e 7500 94 e e Subramaniam et al.
alum b (1990)
Adsorption
0.5 g/L chitosan powder 26e30 5.0 e e e e z2000 z99 Ahmad et al. (2003c,
2004, 2005e)
2 g/L chitosan flake 26e30 5.0 e e e e z2000 z99 Ahmad et al. (2004,
2005e)
0.03 g/L synthetic rubber powder b 27 7 e e e e 850 z88 Ahmad et al. (2005a)
0.5 g/L chitosan powder e 4.5 e e 10,000 99.8 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2005f)
8 g/L bentonite e 4.5 e e 10,000 99.3 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2005f)
12 g/L activated carbon e 4.5 e e 10,000 99.7 2000 99 Ahmad et al. (2005f)
Other physicochemical methods
One stage extraction by n-heptane RT e e e e e e 65 Hameed et al. (2001)
One stage extraction by n-pentane RT e e e e e e 58 Hameed et al. (2001)
Hydrolysis by 5% HCl 75 e e e e e e 53.57 Wong et al. (2002a)
Depth filtration (stone) RT e 70,900 35.5 25,800 80.9 e e Wu et al. (2006b,
2007)
Depth filtration (stone þ sand) RT e 70,900 42.3 25,800 96.7 e e Wu et al. (2006b,
2007)
Depth filtration (stone þ sand) þ surface RT e 70,900 45.3 25,800 97.3 e e Wu et al. (2006b,
filtration 2007)
a
Unless otherwise stated, all the treatment processes are used to treat raw POME.
b
Diluted POME is treated.
c
Anaerobically digested POME is treated.
d
RT ¼ room temperature.
e
MOAE ¼ M. oleifera seeds after oil extraction.
f
BOD (mg/l) and BOD reduction (%) are used.
g
1.83  103 mg/dm3 of aluminum salt and 2.5 mg/dm3 of polyelectrolyte C are used.
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
emphasis on the first two of the above-mentioned parameters. The
optimum conditions for the treatment of pre-treated POME via
chemical coagulation and flocculation in terms of COD removal in
a UASFF reactor were found to be 2.45 l/d and 0.75 m/h for the feed
flow rate and the up-flow velocity, respectively (Zinatizadeh et al.,
2006a, 2007a). As a comparison, Zinatizadeh et al. (2007a) found
that the optimum conditions for the treatment of pre-treated POME
via sedimentation in terms of COD removal in a UASFF reactor were
1.65 l/d and 0.6 m/h for the feed flow rate and the up-flow velocity,
respectively.
The development of microbial granules can also be affected by
conditions affecting the operation of the reactor (Liu et al., 2003). In
the treatment of POME, Najafpour et al. (2006) postulated that the
gas bubbles produced from the sludge blanket, the cell precipita-
tion from the middle part of the fixed film and the large content of
suspended solids of POME were the reasons for the high driving
force successfully enhancing a rapid microbial granulation in the
UASFF reactor.
4.3. Physicochemical treatment
The treatment of POME is, however, not limited to biological
processes. Physicochemical treatments have also received some
attention, since they have been used earlier to varying degrees of
success (Hemming, 1977; Webb et al., 1976). Physicochemical
treatment processes would be particularly useful in applications
where it is desired to combine an effluent treatment with the
recovery of POME solids, in which case the recovered solids could
be reused as fertilizer and animal feed. The suggested physico-
chemical treatment processes for POME include sedimentation,
centrifugation, coagulation, flocculation, flotation and adsorption.
The performance of such a physicochemical treatment process is
summarized in Table 8.
4.3.1. Sedimentation and centrifugation
Karim and Hie (1987) as well as Ng et al. (1987) found that POME
did not settle well, which resulted in a slight reduction of total
suspended solid (TSS) without the aid of a coagulant. The settle-
ability of the raw POME, which is defined as the ratio between the
depth of the supernatant layer and the original height of the POME
suspension in a measuring cylinder, was only 20% after 20 h (Ng
et al., 1987). Ho and Tan (1989) also agreed that POME hardly
settled under gravitational conditions they suggested that clari-
fying POME without the aid of coagulants would not be a viable
technique. However, the POME could be settled forcefully in
a shorter period of time by centrifugation. When raw POME was
centrifuged at 15,000 rpm for 30 min at room temperature, it could
be separated into a thin layer of oil, a clear brownish solution
(supernatant) and a compact mass (residue) (Mashitah et al., 2002).
Preliminary investigations indicated that centrifugation at high
speed (10,000g) and low temperature (5  C) would simultaneously
cream the oil droplets and sediment the suspended and colloidal
particles of the POME (Ho and Tan, 1983). Analysis of the oil-free
supernatant that contained all the soluble constituents of the
effluent displayed a 40% and 100% reduction in COD and TSS,
respectively, as a result of the centrifugation. However, results
obtained by Wong et al. (2002b) showed corresponding values of
only 30% and 86%, respectively.
4.3.2. Coagulation and flocculation
Before applying any of the physical liquidesolid separation
processes with any degree of success, the POME suspension would
have to be destabilized and the particles encouraged to flocculate
and form larger aggregates. Karim and Hie (1987) reported that
treatment of POME with 80e100 mg/l Magnafloc LT22 cationic
1479
polymer reduced the turbidity, COD, total solids and TSS of the
POME up to 96%, 63%, 53% and 93.5%, respectively. However,
a chemical treatment with a combination of an inorganic salt
(FeCl3) and polymer (Magnafloc LT22) did not help to further
reduce the pollution strength of the POME as compared to the use
of the Magnafloc LT22 polymer alone. Ng et al. (1987) found that
aluminum sulphate (alum) was significantly more effective than
polymers and lime in terms of settleability in the coagulation of
POME but that the polymers should be viewed more favorably as
they do not require pH adjustment and since the amount of added
chemicals was significantly less. Ng et al. (1987) also discovered
that increasing the temperature up to 70  C unexpectedly led to the
highest TSS removal by the Zetag-92 polymer. It was possible that
the high level of solids in the POME afforded a certain protection to
the polymer, leading to an incomplete hydrolysis of the poly-
acrylamide chains. According to Ahmad et al. (2003b, 2005b), pre-
treatment processes consisting of coagulationeflocculation and
adsorption using activated carbon played a significant role in the
pre-treatment of POME before the membrane filtration process.
The pre-treated POME was found to be odorless and the color
became a palish yellow as opposed to the actual raw POME, which
had a dark brown color and a pungent smell (Ahmad et al., 2005b).
A full-factorial central composite design was chosen by Ahmad
et al. (2005c) to explain the effect and interaction of three factors,
namely the coagulant dosage, the flocculant dosage and the pH. The
design enabled the determination of optimized parameters, where
78% of water recovery with a 20 NTU turbidity value could be
obtained at an optimum dosage of coagulant, flocculant and pH, i.e.
at 15 g/l, 0.3 g/l and 6, respectively. Later, Ahmad et al. (2008)
showed that the inorganic coagulant could actually be completely
replaced with water-soluble organic polymers in POME pre-treat-
ment by using direct flocculation without the need of pH adjust-
ment under applied shear. The direct flocculation process
significantly reduced the treatment cost by a factor of 3.6 compared
to the conventional coagulationeflocculation process.
Ariffin et al. (2005) synthesized cationic polyacrylamides of
varying charge densities in order to assess the flocculation effec-
tiveness of POME. It was found that by varying the charge density of
the polymer from 48.2 to 485 C/g, the flocculant's performance
could be significantly affected in which case the cationic poly-
acrylamide with the highest charge density (485 C/g) enabled the
highest performance of POME treatment with a dosage as low as
32 mg/l at pH 3. By using the synthesized cationic polyacrylamides,
Ariffin et al. (2003) found that the floccule size increased with
increasing polymer dosage, polymer molecular weight and poly-
mer charge density, and this larger floccule size was expected to
improve the treatment efficiency. However, the higher molecular
weight cationic polyacrylamide (over 5 million g/mol) produced
very poor floccule formation as a result of polyelectrolytes with
very high molecular weights not becoming readily dissolved but
rather tending to form gel clumps (Ariffin et al., 2004). Ahmad et al.
(2006b) carried out a comparative study between chitosan, alum
and polyaluminum chloride (PAC) for the removal of the residual oil
and TSS found in the POME. Their results proved that chitosan was
comparatively more efficient and economical as opposed to alum
and PAC. Krishnan et al. (2006) tested the digestibility of a sludge
resulting from the coagulation process when alum was used as the
coagulant and a cationic polyelectrolyte was the coagulant aid in an
anaerobic digester. The results showed that the anaerobic biomass,
when subjected to varying alum dosage in the coagulated palm oil
sludge, did not exhibit inhibition as a result of the digester
performance being in conformity with the regular treatment
process. Bhatia et al. (2007a,b) also utilized an environmental
friendly and natural coagulant, namely Moringa oleifera seeds, in
the pre-treatment of POME. M. oleifera seeds after oil extraction
1480 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
(MOAE) gave rise to a high removal of TSS and a significant
reduction in COD. An even higher removal of TSS could be obtained
by combining MOAE with the biodegradable flocculant NALCO
7751. Bhatia et al. (2007a) employed a response surface method-
ology to optimize the POME treatment using a M. oleifera seed
extract and flocculant. It was found that a high removal of TSS and
recovery of the sludge could be obtained when the process vari-
ables were chosen as follows: pH 5, settling time 114 min, M. olei-
fera dosage 3469 mg/l and flocculant dosage 6736 mg/l. The
recovered sludge could be reused as an organic fertilizer. Bhatia
et al. (2007b) also found that an increase in operation tempera-
ture from 30 to 70  C reduced the efficiency of the coagulatione-
flocculation process. This might be due to the particle transport
processes or particle collision rates and through the effect on
viscosity (concentration) in POME. The floccule strength became
weaker with the increase in temperature and the macrofloccule
could be easily broken.
Electrocoagulation offers an alternative to the use of metal salts
or polymers and polyelectrolyte addition for breaking stable
emulsions and suspensions. Agustin et al. (2008) used electro-
coagulation for the treatment of POME, in which case aluminum
and sodium chloride were used as electrodes and supporting
electrolyte, respectively. This study shows that electrocoagulation
not only could treat POME to some extent but also reduce the
contents of heavy metals and phenolic compounds from the POME.
4.3.3. Flotation
Ho and Chan (1986) reported on electroflotation of POME at pH
4 and 10 using a lead dioxide-titanium anode and a stainless steel
cathode. Approximately half of the original COD was removed at pH
10 within 3 h of electrolysis and prolonging the electrolysis to 20 h
only slightly improved the removal. The higher overall COD
removal for the electrolyzed dispersion at pH 10 was in fact mainly
due to an improved electroflotation of the suspended particles,
mostly plant cell debris and enmeshed oil droplets at higher pH. Ng
et al. (1988) suggested that it was technically feasible to use dis-
solved air flotation for liquidesolid separation in POME treatment
but a higher pressure (560 kPa) or recycle ratio (exceeding 6) was
required in order to maintain a 90% TSS removal. Some disagree-
ment exists concerning the effectiveness of dissolved air floatation
for the removal of TSS from POME. Sufficient data and information
on experimental conditions have often been unavailable, making
a critical assessment of the process difficult (Hemming, 1977;
Thillaimuthu, 1976). While Hemming (1977), Ho and Tan (1989)
as well as Thillaimuthu (1976), suggested that chemical floccula-
tion assisted dissolved air floatation through significant removal of
TSS, Chooi (1979), on the other hand, reported that dissolved air
floatation with or without chemical flocculants has been
unsuccessful. According to Ho and Tan (1989), the removal effi-
ciency of COD could be significantly increased if chemical floccu-
lation was used prior to the dissolved air floatation process since
the inorganic coagulant together with the polymeric flocculant
could destabilize the particulates and the developed floccules could
adhere to the micro-bubbles thus resulting in a better rate of
floatation of the suspended floccules. Subramaniam et al. (1990)
used colloidal gas aphrons (CGAs), a suspension of microalgae
and suspensions of three inorganic minerals to clarify POME. In all
cases (for either diluted or undiluted POME), a removal of sus-
pended solids of about 95% could be obtained (some 10 min after
the sparging of the CGA ceased). This was despite the fact that the
quantity of CGA sparged at the lowest solids concentration was less
than that used at the higher concentration. Subramaniam et al.
(1990) also found that the treatment performance deteriorated at
an increasing rate as the temperature was increased. In their study,
the addition of alum gave rise to minor improvements in solid
removal and its use would appear to be justified only when it was
desirable to recover as much solids as possible or to achieve the
greatest possible degree of clarification.
4.3.4. Adsorption
Ahmad et al. (2003c, 2004) reported on a high removal of
residual oil from POME by using chitosan. These results agree well
with those of Ahmad et al. (2005e), who further stated that the
powder form of chitosan with a mesh size below 120 exhibited
a greater rate of adsorption of residual oil from POME as compared
to the flake type with a size smaller 2.0 mm. Ahmad et al. (2005f)
carried out a comparative study between chitosan, bentonite and
activated carbon for the removal of residual oil and TSS in POME, in
which chitosan was found to be the best adsorbent of the three.
This phenomenon was due to the high and intense agitation,
believed to cause the adsorbents to break up and reintroduce the oil
residue to the system (Divakaran and Pillai, 2001). Ahmad et al.
(2005a) used a synthetic rubber powder to adsorb the residual oil
in POME although the rubber by itself is seldom used as an
adsorbent. The adsorption processes with both the chitosan
(Ahmad et al., 2005e) and the synthetic rubber powder (Ahmad
et al., 2005a) fitted very well with the Freundlich model. Osuidea
et al. (2006) compared the adsorption properties of sawdust
modified with propenoic acid to those of the activated carbon
powder in the tertiary treatment of POME, which was previously
clarified with iron(III) chloride and lime. They found that the acti-
vated carbon powder had a somewhat better efficiency with
respect to the POME treatment, but both adsorbents yielded a clear
effluent with a wider reuse applicability after the application of
optimum adsorption conditions.
4.3.5. Other physicochemical methods
Extraction processes with n-pentane, n-hexane and n-heptane
were carried out by Hameed et al. (2001) with the aim of treating
and recovering residual palm oil from POME. n-Heptane was
determined to be the most effective solvent in the extraction
process, followed by n-hexane and n-pentane. Wong et al. (2002a)
conducted a preliminary experiment using acidification and
hydrolysis of the raw POME with diluted HCl. The settled solution
was segregated into two phases and the percentage of oil in the
light phase of the treated samples was generally higher than in the
heavy phase. This clearly indicated the effect of HCl on freeing the
entrapped oil from the solid particles of POME. Later, Wong et al.
(2009b) found that the elevated operating temperature of the
treatment (95  C) enhanced the oil separation from the emulsion
and the introduction of magnet would produce higher rate of
flotation than that of without magnet even in the absence of
stirring. Wu et al. (2006b, 2007) and Mohammad et al. (2009) used
depth and surface filtration to pre-treat raw POME. The combina-
tion of pre-treatment processes showed promising results in
reducing TSS and turbidity but only a small reduction of the total
dissolved solids could be achieved with this method.
4.4. Membrane filtration process
The membrane filtration process for treating POME has never
been applied on an industrial scale due to the fact that POME
contains large amounts of suspended solids (Ahmad et al., 2003b)
and a macrosolute-like protein (Wu et al., 2007), which would
eventually foul and degrade the membrane during the treatment.
Therefore, a pre-treatment of raw POME is usually applied prior to
the membrane filtration process. For examples, Wong et al. (2002b)
applied three separate pre-treatment methods, namely filtration,
centrifugation and coagulation before treating POME with the
ultrafiltration membrane. It was found that the combination of
 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
filtrationeultrafiltration treatment of POME produced the best-
treated sample quality in terms of pollutant contents elimination.
Ahmad et al. (2003a, b) designed a pilot plant for POME treatment
where two stages of treatment were conducted. Chemical coagu-
lation and adsorption played their roles during the first stage as
membrane pre-treatment processes whereas ultrafiltration and
reverse osmosis techniques were combined in the second stage as
membrane filtration processes. Wu et al. (2006b, 2007) and
Mohammad et al. (2009) applied physical pre-treatment processes
consisting of depth and surface filtrations prior to the treatment of
POME with the ultrafiltration membrane. In addition to the treat-
ment of POME, Wu et al. (2006b, 2007) also discovered that the
ultrafiltration process was able to recover protein and carbohydrate
from pre-treated POME, up to 61.4% and 76.4%, respectively, at an
applied pressure of 8 bar. Zhang et al. (2008b) adopted a two-stage
system to treat POME, with anaerobic expanded granular sludge
bed reactor as the first biological stage as well as ultrafiltration and
reverse osmosis processes as the second stage. After the whole
treatment processes, organic matters, suspended solids and color
were removed almost entirely, only trace amount of dissolved
solids, except K and Na, were detected.
According to Ahmad et al. (2005b), both ceramic (10,000
MWCO) and polyvinylidene difluoride (200,000 MWCO)
membranes were able to reject suspended solid contents exceeding
97%, regardless of the imposed transmembrane pressure and
crossflow velocity. In total, the ceramic membrane performed
better than the polyvinylidene difluoride one in the treatment of
pre-treated POME. This might be due to the higher MWCO for the
polyvinylidene difluoride membrane (200,000 MWCO) as
compared to that of the ceramic membrane (10,000 MWCO) thus
allowing the passage of more organic matter into the permeate
stream. Besides, a higher membrane resistance in the ceramic as
compared to in the polyvinylidene difluoride membrane due to
membrane properties such as thickness and hardness might also
contribute to these results. Ahmad et al. (2005d) stated that the
critical flux value increased with the increase in crossflow velocity.
This finding was parallel with the literature reports implying that
the critical flux is dependent on numerous parameters such as
suspension properties (particle size and concentration), surface
interaction (ionic strength, zeta potential, pH) and hydrodynamic
conditions (crossflow velocity) (Bacchin, 2004). The determined
values were important as optimized parameters for a membrane
pilot plant in the treatment of POME (Ahmad et al., 2005d). Ahmad
et al. (2006a) reclaimed the drinking water from POME by using
membrane filtration processes (ultrafiltration and reverse osmosis)
coupled with coagulation and flocculation as pre-treatment steps.
The study showed that a water recovery from POME of approxi-
mately 78% could be obtained with a great reduction in terms of
pollutants. Pollutant contents were below the maximum contam-
inant level set by the USEPA for drinking water standards. Reverse
osmosis gave rise to a high efficiency in the COD removal in pre-
treated POME due to the significant rejection of carbohydrate
constituents, protein and ammoniacal nitrogen in order to achieve
the desired water quality (Ahmad et al., 2007). Ahmad et al. (2007)
pointed out that it was possible to predict the performance of
reverse osmosis, in terms of COD removal in pre-treated POME,
through complex organic solutions. This was done by applying the
coupled model of concentration polarization and the extended
SpieglereKedem model while considering soluteesolute
interactions.
Significant reductions in flux for short time periods during the
membrane filtration of pre-treated POME indicated a development
of membrane fouling (Ahmad et al., 2005b, 2006a, 2007; Suwandi,
1993; Wu et al., 2007; Mohammad et al., 2009). Due to this
membrane fouling, the long-term flux decline followed a general
1481
trend: it started with a steep decline followed by a gradual decrease
and approached its final value asymptotically (Suwandi, 1993).
According to Ahmad et al. (2005b), the flux decline was due to cake
build-up (Mikulásek et al., 2004) and deposition of small particles
and colloids on the membrane surface (Balakrishnan et al., 2000),
which led to membrane fouling. However, Wu et al. (2007) stated
that pore-blocking might play a significant role in protein fouling of
the membrane during the treatment of pre-treated POME. They
found that, after ultrafiltration of pre-treated POME, all the
membranes showed denser pore structures, suggesting the occur-
rence of pore-blocking especially when being compared to scan-
ning electron micrographs of the clean ultrafiltration membrane. In
general, such membrane fouling causes an increase in the
membrane cleaning cost, process down time as well as the
membrane damage due to the frequency and harshness of the
cleaning conditions (Maartens et al., 2002). Contrarily, Wu et al.
(2007) found that the occurred fouling not only improved the
treatment of pre-treated POME but also enhanced the recovery of
protein and carbohydrate from the wastewater. Mohammad et al.
(2009) also concluded that hydrophobic ultrafiltration membrane
with the highest MWCO (20,000 MWCO) and operated at the
highest applied pressure (10 bar) gave the best performance of
POME treatment and protein recovery. The performance of the
membrane filtration process together with the corresponding pre-
treatment process(es) is summarized in Table 9.
5. Discussion
The discussion about POME treatment is mainly based on an
‘end-of-pipe’ strategy. Although a few methods have been
proposed by a number of researchers, the ponding system is still
the most common POME treatment system, used by more than 85%
of the palm oil mills in Malaysia (Ma and Ong, 1985). This may be
due to the fact that large area of lands in Malaysia and Indonesia
could be used as pond areas for POME treatment. Table 10 shows
the advantages and disadvantages for each POME treatment
processes. It can be observed that ponding system is more
economically viable and have the capacity to tolerate a wider range
of OLR (Poh and Chong, 2009). However, the major concern about
the ponding system is the uncontrollable release of large amounts
of CH4 and CO2 into the atmosphere from open ponds, which may
worsen the effect of global warming. The emission rate of CH4 from
the pond is about 6.54 kg/t fresh fruit bunch, equivalent to 137.4 kg
carbon dioxide released into the air (Schuchardt et al., 2008). Fig. 6
indicates future trends of CH4 emission estimated from past crude
palm oil production and predictions of the future. The figure esti-
mates that 0.36 million tons of CH4 will be emitted from POME
treatment ponds in 2020 (Shirai et al., 2003). Since the greenhouse
effect of CH4 is approximately 20 times that of the global warming
potential for 100 years with respect to CO2 (Milich, 1999), the
greenhouse effect from ponding systems in Malaysia would be
equivalent to 7.2 million tonnes of CO2 emission by the year of 2020.
It is therefore wise to convert ponding and open tank digesters
systems into closed tank systems or high-rate bioreactors, thus
enabling biogas recovery by sealing the tank or using a bioreactor
through application of a Clean Development Mechanism project.
The total cost for sealing the open digester tanks, gas storage,
electric power generation unit, accessories and power distribution,
etc., for such a project at Serting Hilir Mill has been estimated at RM
7.9 million or US$ 2.08 million (Shirai et al., 2003). The electricity
generated from the biogas could be sold for the ‘green price’ that
was set by the government at RM 0.16 for 1 kW h (Malaysian
Electricity Supply Industry Trust Account, 2000), in the effort to
encourage the use of electricity originating from biomass.
 1482
Table 9
The performance of a membrane filtration process together with the corresponding pre-treatment process(es).

Treatment processesa Membrane characteristics Operational conditionsb Parametersc References

COD TSS

Material Molecular weight cut off Temperature Applied pressure Influent Overall Influent Overall
(MWCO) ( C) (bar) (mg/l) reduction (%) (mg/l) reduction (%)

T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Filtrationd þ UFe Cellulose ester 5000 e 4.5 1,336 85.6 {85.2} 667 [612] 99.2 {99.2} Wong et al.
[1,306] (2002b)
Centrifugationd þ UF Cellulose ester 5000 e 4.5 1,336 [931] 55.8 {36.5} 657 [90] 93.9 {55.5}
Coagulationd þ UF Cellulose ester 5000 e 4.5 1,448 [806] 71.9 {49.5} 700 [150] 100 {100}
Coagulation þ flocculation þ adsorption þ Ceramic(UF) 0.5e1.0 mm(UF) e 1e4.5(UF) 26,107 98.8 {97.3} e e Ahmad et al.
(UF þ ROf) TFC(RO) 99.9% NaCl retention(RO) 10e50(RO) [11,460] (2003a, b)
Coagulation þ flocculation þ adsorption þ Ceramic 10,000 30 2 50,000 z92 {z48} 59,350 [80] z100 {>97} Ahmad et al.
UF (8 m/h)g [7,500] (2005b, d)
Coagulation þ flocculation þ adsorption þ Polyvinylidene 200,000 30 2 50,000 z88 {z18} 59,350 [80] z100 {>97} Ahmad et al.
UF (0.8 m/h) difluoride [7,500] (2005b)
Coagulation þ flocculation þ Polyvinylidene 200,000(UF) 25(UF) 2(UF) 50,000 99.8 {99.4} e e Ahmad et al.
(UF þ RO) (0.1 m/s) difluoride(UF) [15,000] (2006a)
TFC(RO) 99.9% NaCl retention(RO) 25(RO) 45(RO)
Depth filtration (stone þ sand) þ surface Polysulphone 20,000 25 8 70,900 77.2 {57.0} 25,800 99.9 {97.7} Wu et al. (2006b,
filtration þ UF [37,633] [700] 2007)
Anaerobic expanded granular sludge bed e 100,000(UF) 25 2(UF) 32,520 z100 {z100} 11,780 z100 {z100} Zhang et al.
reactor þ (UF þ RO) 99.6% NaCl retention(RO) 13(RO) [774.9] [289.6] (2008b)
a
Unless otherwise stated, all the treatment processes are used to treat raw POME.
b
The operational conditions are only referred to membrane filtration process.
c
The values in brackets, namely [ ] and { } are referred to pre-treated POME (mg/l) and % reduction of pre-treated POME after undergoing membrane filtration process(es), respectively.
d
Anaerobically digested POME is treated.
e
UF ¼ Ultrafiltration.
f
RO ¼ Reverse osmosis.
g
Crossflow velocity.
Table 10
Advantages and disadvantages of various treatment processes for POME.
Treatment processes Advantages
Ponding Reliable and stable.
system Anaerobically digested POME
from the ponds could be used to
culture algae.
Cheap, simple to construct and
has low maintenance costs.
The energy needed to operate a
ponding system is minimal
Recovered sludge cake from pond
can be sold as fertilizer.
Aerobic With suitable level of dissolved
digestion oxygen, filamentous growth and
sludge bulking in POME could be
prevented.
If the oxygen input exceeds the
requirement of the aerobic
microorganisms, the system
would be more efficient with shorter
hydraulic retention time than
anaerobic digestion.
Anaerobic suspended Biogas generated from a closed tank
growth processes digestercauses
circulation and mixing within the
digester.
The produced biogas from a
closed tank digester could be
harnessed for heat and generation
of electricity.
The digester liquor could be
applied to the plantation as fertilizer.
Capital investment costs of the
treatment could be reduced if the tank
volume is reduced through two-phase
fermentation.
Eliminate the requirement of cooling
facilities prior to biological treatment if
thermophilic condition is introduced
in the treatment process.
Attached growth Immobilized-cell reactor:
anaerobic A high COD removal (without
processes dilution of POME) could be
achieved at high volumetric loads
but lower HRT.
Anaerobic filter:
Handling wastewaters with high
pollution loads but less sensitive to
shock loads with lower HRT.
Overall COD removal in the
treatment of POME
Disadvantages References
Large areas of land are required, making it Agamuthu (1995); Chan and Chooi (1982); Chin et al. (1996);
unsuitable for factories located in the near Chooi (1984); Edewor (1986); John (1985); Khalid and
urban and other developed areas Wan Mustafa (1992); Ma and Ong (1985); Phang (1982);
The removal of nitrogen and solids are usually Phang and Ong (1988); Poh and Chong (2009); Shirai et al. (2003);
unsatisfactory. Sivalingam (1980).
Dead spots or short circulations with islands of floating
solids could be found in anaerobic ponds due to an
inadequate mixing by the evolved biogas.
Difficult to control and monitor in view of their sizes and
configurations.
Sludge accumulation is usually high.
Pond maintenance is labor-intensive.
Uncontrollable release of CH4 and CO2 into the
atmosphere.
T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
Long hydraulic retention time.
The aeration system in the aerobic digestion Agamuthu (1995); Ho and Tan (1988); Ma and
is very energy intensive. Ong (1985).
The aerobic digestion needs to be incorporated
into other treatment systems, preferably
anaerobic ones.
POME is not nutritionally balanced for the aerobic
growth of microorganisms.
Uncontrollable release of CH4 into the Borja-Padilla and Banks (1993); Chin (1981); Ibrahim et al. (1985);
environment foropen tank digester. Khalid and Wan Mustafa (1992); Ng et al. (1985); Quah and
Imbalances might occur between acid- and Gillies (1981); Yacob et al. (2005).
methane-forming microorganisms at short
retention times in a
typical anaerobic digester.
If thermophilic condition is applied in a
closed tank digester, high pressure build-up and
spillage of the mixed liquor through the vent
might happen.
Immobilized-cell reactor Borja and Banks (1994b); Borja and Banks (1994c); Borja and Banks (1995);
Very dependent on support materials in the Denac and Dunn (1988); Maestrojuan et al. (1986); Metcalf and Eddy, Inc. (2003);
production and composition of biogas as well Poh and Chong (2009); Russo et al. (1985); Setiadi and Arief (1992);
as the proportions in which the different Setiadi et al. (1993); Sutton and Huss (1984); Young and McCarty (1969)
types of microorganisms develop.
Anaerobic filter:
Increasing the load of POME may lead to blockage
of the filter medium in the lower part of the bed.
Anaerobic fluidized bed reactor:
High power requirements for bed fluidization and high
cost of carrier media.
(continued on next page)
1483
Table 10 (continued )
Treatment processes
Anaerobic sludge
blanket
processes
Membrane separation
anaerobic treatment process The utilization of chemical reagents
Hybrid anaerobic
treatment process
Advantages
without dilution has been found
to be very high.
Both construction and operation
as well as maintenance costs
are lower.
The treated effluent contains
minimal amounts of
suspended solids.
Biological system is able to recover
more quickly back to the condition.
Smaller reactor volume.
Anaerobic fluidized
bed reactor:
High biomass concentrations
as well as relatively high mass
transfer characteristics, the handling
of shock loads and minimal space
requirements.
High organic loadings than anaerobic
filter for POME treatment.
Up-flow anaerobic sludge
blanket reactor (UASB):
High organic loadings, short HRT
and has a low energy demand.
High removal of COD for POME
treatment.
High concentration of biomass as
granular sludge retained in the
reactor.
Anaerobic baffled reactor (ABR):
Simple and inexpensive to construct.
Stability to shock loading and a
capability of achieving high
volumetric rates.
With proper modification of ABR,
high retention time of the cells and
efficient treatment of POME could be
maintained.
Production of a clear final effluent.
to a lesser extent.
Lower energy requirements for
maintenance.
Compactness of the equipment.
A faster start-up and plant
automation.
Up-flow anaerobic sludge
fixed film reactor (UASFF)
Shorter development times for the
granulation of
anaerobic sludge with higher
biomass retention.
High COD removal could be obtained
at a low HRT for POME treatment.
Higher organic loading rate
achievable compared to operating
UASB or anaerobic filtration alone.
1484
Disadvantages References
Only bacteria that are more readily attached to the reactor
packing are selected under the highly turbulent conditions.
Difficulties in maintaining biofilm thicknesses and the
large amounts of energy are required to keep the
bioparticles in fluidized conditions for POME treatment.
T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
Up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket Bachmann et al. (1985); Boopathy et al. (1988); Borja and
reactor (UASB): Banks (1994a); Faisal and Unno (2001); Grobicki and Stuckey
Performance dependant on sludge settleability. (1991); Liu and Tay (2004); Metcalf and Eddy, Inc. (2003);
Longer development times for anaerobic sludge Nachaiyasit and Stuckey (1997); Poh and
granules. Chong (2009); Setiadi et al. (1996); Zhang et al. (2008).
Foaming and flotation of granular sludge at high
organic loading rate, especially after oil and grease
from the POME are absorbed on it, coupled with the abundant
biogas
bubbles adhering to it.
Granulation inhibition at high volatile fatty acid
concentration.
Excessive surface scum may form in the reactor because of
the
presence of oil and grease in the POME.
Anaerobic baffled reactor (ABR):
Sufficient recycling is needed to maintain the reactor
stability when treating POME.
Occurrence of fouling due to the long solid retention Fakhru'l-Razi and Noor (1999); Nagano et al. (1992)
time of
the system, which allows the decomposition of the
suspended solids on the membrane.
Up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film Najafpour et al. (2006); Poh and Chong (2009);
reactor (UASFF) Zinatizadeh et al. (2006a); Zinatizadeh et al. (2006b);
Pretreatment of POME is required as indigestible Zinatizadeh et al. (2007a).
TSS in the POME may gradually accumulate in the
reactor and reduce the overall treatment efficiency.
The stability/performance of the reactor is very
depending on the internal packing, high ratio of
effluent recycling,
feed flow rate and the up-flow velocity.
Table 10 (continued )

Treatment processes Advantages Disadvantages References

Problems of clogging eliminated.
More stable operation and ability to
tolerate shock loadings.
Sedimentation Cheap because only gravitational
force is used.
Centrifugation POME could be separated into a thin
layer of oil
and a compact mass (residue).
High TSS removal from the POME.
Coagulation & Destabilization of POME suspension
flocculation so that larger
aggregates could be formed.
High TSS removal from the POME.
Polymers do not require pH
adjustment.
POME hardly settles even after prolonged Ho and Tan (1989); Karim and Hie (1987); Ng et al. (1987).
time periods.
Low COD removal from the POME. Ho and Tan (1983); Mashitah et al. (2002); Wong et al. (2002b).
Sometimes, an increase in operation temperature Agustin et al. (2008); Ahmad et al. (2006b); Ahmad et al. (2008);
may reduce the efficiency of the coagulatione Bhatia et al. (2007a, b); Ho and Tan (1989); Ng et al. (1987)
flocculation process.
Inorganic coagulants are depending heavily on
suitable pH adjustment.
Inorganic coagulants create a voluminous activated

T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490

Inexpensive and readily available for sludge, composed of metal hydrolysis products that
inorganic coagulants. cannot bereadily disposed.
Natural coagulants such as chitosan Removal of COD and BOD5 from POME are lower
and Moringa oleifera seeds are using electrocoagulation
biodegradable
and not health-threatening materials,
which could be used as
coagulants in POME treatment.
Electrocoagulation is able to reduce the
contents of heavy metals and phenolic
compounds from the POME.
Isolation of possible phenolic
antioxidant from the coagulum of
POME is possible after the
electrocoagulation process.
Flotation Flotation together with chemical Higher pressure or recycle ratio is required to Hemming (1977); Ho and Tan (1989); Ng et al. (1988); Thillaimuthu (1976);
flocculation may maintain high TSS removal from the POME. Subramaniam et al. (1990).
improve the removal of TSS from the Perform well at low surface loading rates (less
POME. than 2 m3/m3 h) and the unit would result in very
large facilities with typical flow rates of POME.
Adsorption High removal of residual oil from For better removal of pollutants in POME, adsorption Ahmad et al. (2003b, 2003c, 2004, 2005b, 2005f).
POME using chitosan. would be the best to combine with coagulation and
Chitosan is very intact as compared to flocculation processes.
activated carbon and bentonite even
after a prolonged mixing time in
POME.
Membrane The treated water or permeate of Fouling and degradation of the membrane during Ahmad et al. (2003a,b, 2005b, 2006a); Wu et al. (2007);
filtration POME could be used as possible drinking POME treatment. Poh and Chong (2009); Mohammad et al. (2009).
process water or recycled to the plant for Pre-treatment of POME is necessary to reduce
internal usage membrane fouling.
High rejection of TSS from POME. To restore membrane performance to its initial state,
Smaller space requirement for cleaning of membrane using chemicals is required.
membrane treatment plant as
compared to ponding
system of POME.

1485
1486 T.Y. Wu et al. / Journal of Environmental Management 91 (2010) 1467e1490
If the POME treatment through anaerobic digestion is successful
and the CH4 is harvested, the impact of the POME on environment
would be removed. POME would then become a savings to the
environment due to the reuse of the treated POME as fertilizers at
the plantations. However, CH4 is not harvested in most of the palm
oil mills due to the lacking of infrastructure to channel this excess
energy. Also, since the mills have excess energy from their biomass,
it seems that it will not be a viable move to invest a large sum of
money on a CH4 harvesting system. However, changing policies as
well as creating infrastructures and incentives by the government
may help promote the interests among the palm oil industries to
invest in CH4 harvesting system in the near future (Subramaniam
et al., 2008).
Although numerous physicochemical methods based on the
laboratory scale were proposed to treat POME, none of those
methods could actually be applied alone in palm oil mills. For
instance, coagulation, flocculation and adsorption could be applied
together with membrane filtration process to produce good quality
effluent (Ahmad et al., 2003a,b) but if the physicochemical methods
are used alone on the treatment of POME, very large amount of
coagulants and adsorbents would be required which make the
overall treatment process unfeasible and uneconomical. Although
other physicochemical method such as dissolved air flotation was
technically feasible to be used for liquidesolid separation in POME
treatment, it may be of limited utility in the treatment of POME in
real palm oil mill. This is because the dissolved air flotation only
performs well at low surface loading rates (less than 2 m3/m3 h)
and the units would surely result in very large facilities with typical
flow rates of POME (Ng et al., 1988).
Although membrane filtration process offers a good quality of
treated POME, the main bottleneck of this treatment process is
membrane fouling. Also, membrane filtration process is not ready
to be introduced in local palm oil mills because for the time being,
there is no local membrane fabricator and the imported membrane
is expensive (Ahmad and Chan, 2009). If the membrane could be
made locally and the membrane fouling could be reduced to
a certain extent, sustainable development in the palm oil mills with
zero discharge could certainly be achieved by using innovative
membrane treatment. This is because the recovered sludge from
the pre-treatment system can be used as fertilizer and the recov-
ered water from the membrane system can be recycled as utility or
boiler feed water. If the membrane filtration process is used for
treating POME in palm oil mill, it is advisable to choose the most
optimal design, which is a membrane system (consisted of reverse
osmosis polymeric only) operated at higher operating pressure
(45 bar) with the lowest membrane unit cost (RM 7.03/m3) (Ahmad
et al., 2009). This is because maintaining a high supply pressure is
less costly than increasing the membrane area.
Currently, end-of-pipe standards imposed through “command
and control regulations” are the basis of environmental legislation
(Olguín et al., 2004). However, an international trend promoting
pollution prevention through cleaner production is emerging.
Within this context, a number of researchers proposed that
a wastewater management based on the promotion of environ-
mentally sound biotechnologies could be included as a part of the
POME management in Malaysia in order to attain a sustainable
development. The reuse of POME in bioprocessing is possible
because POME contains high concentrations of carbohydrate,
protein, nitrogenous compounds, lipids and minerals (Habib et al.,
1997; Hwang et al., 1978; Phang, 1990; Wu et al., 2006a, 2009a, b)
that may be converted into useful materials through microbial
processes (Agamuthu and Tan, 1985). POME and its derivative have
been exploited as fermentation media to produce various products/
metabolites such as antibiotic, bioinsecticide, solvents, poly-
hydroxyalkanoate, organic acids as well as enzymes to a certain
degree of success (Wu et al., 2009a). The recovery of substances
from POME as potential nutrient sources or food for fish (Phang,
1990; Phang and Ong, 1988; Yusoff et al., 1996), shrimp (Jawahar
Ali and Brendonck, 1995), goats (Agamuthu et al., 1996;
Vadiveloo, 1988) and chironomid larvae (Habib et al., 1997) have
also been reported. To a certain extent, POME could even be utilized
as fertilizer (Azizah Chulan, 1991; Chan et al., 1980; Teoh and Chew,
1983), although employing it as such would have to be carried out
with caution due to the imbalance in the nutrient composition of
POME (Onyia et al., 2001).
6. Conclusions
The palm oil industry is an indisputable source of pollution in
Malaysia. In order to counteract the negative impact of this source,
a pollution prevention strategy is definitely required. Among all the
treatment methods proposed, anaerobic digestion is an advanta-
geous method for POME treatment as it generates valuable end
product that can be exchanged into revenue when registered as
a Clean Development Mechanism project. Furthermore, this
method is also able to treat effluent to a satisfactory quality for
discharge at lower costs (Poh and Chong, 2009). Although it seems
that end-of-pipe processes offer the simplest means for POME
management, such processes should only be chosen as the last
option in waste management as in general they are unable to
provide resource sustainability and, unfortunately, would impose
a so-called “negative value” on the waste. Also, POME may still
possess certain economic values and is not necessarily a waste,
depending on its quality and the accessibility of a market. In fact, it
has been demonstrated that POME could be sustainably reused
through promotion of a cleaner production as well as environ-
mentally sound and cost-effective biotechnologies (Wu et al.,
2009a). POME management by means of a cleaner production,
a topic that is not covered in depth in this paper, is an emerging
approach for achieving an industrially sustainable development.
Certain propositions of integrated systems combine various envi-
ronmentally sound biotechnologies for an enhanced POME
management instead of relying solely upon end-of-pipe processes.
Finally, it is suggested that the choice of POME management
through end-of-pipe processes would directly or indirectly depend
on the achievable degree of effectiveness of the treatment as well as
on other factors such as the size of the palm oil mill, the ultimate
mode of discharge, the economics of the establishment, operation
and maintenance facilities, the level of supervision required and the
anticipated economic benefits combined with the supports from
the government.
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