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Green technology

 Moving bed biofilm reactors

A case of study on paper mill wastewater treatment with MBBR
Staff 13 February 2013

In traditional activated sludge plants, biomass form flocks are kept suspended in
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wastewater and then separated from treated water in a settler; most biomass is re-
circulated to the biological tanks, the excess is extracted and sent to sludge treatment.
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Luigi Falletti, University of Padova

This technique is the most widespread and well known in the world to treat
biodegradable municipal and industrial wastewater (including paper mill wastewater); but
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it has also disadvantages: it requires large tanks, and pollutant removal efficiency is
strongly affected by sludge settleability.

In moving bed biofilm reactors (MBBR) biomass grows as biofilm on plastic carriers that
move freely into wastewater; tanks are similar to activated sludge reactors, and they
have screens or sieves to avoid carriers’ loss; aerated reactors are mixed by aeration
itself, while anoxic and anaerobic reactors are mixed mechanically. MBBR can be
classified into two categories:

1. pure biofilm reactors: biomass grows only on carriers without suspended sludge
and without sludge recirculation;
2. hybrid reactors: in the same tank biomass grows both as biofilm on carriers and as
suspended sludge; part of sludge is re-circulated.

MBBR have several advantages if compared to traditional activated sludge tanks and to
fixed biofilm reactors (trickling filters, submerged biofilters):

-biofilm has high specific activity, therefore high pollutant removal efficiencies can be
achieved with smaller tanks than the ones required by activated sludge;

-in plants with a series of MBBR a specialized biomass grows in each tank;

–risk of clogging with MBBR is much lower than with fixed biofilm reactors, no
backwashing is required since biofilm in excess is detached from carriers by reactor
turbulence itself, and can be separated from treated water by settling or flotation;

-this technology is very flexible in plant conduction: in pure biofilm reactors, the filling
degree can be varied according to process requirements, in hybrid reactors also sludge
recirculation rate can be varied.

Carriers in use

Several kinds of carriers are used in MBBR: they can be classified according to material,
shape, porosity, dimensions, specific surface. Among these characteristics, specific
surface is particularly important: it represents the surface which is available for biofilm

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growth pr. cubic meter carriers. For each kind of carrier,

Table 1 – Characteristics of carriers for
MBBR produced by AnoxKaldnesTM
Company
produce surfactant substances, so some scum can be observed during the first days in
plant starting [1, 2, 3, 4].
part of specific surface is protected and the remaining
part is external; biofilm grows almost only on protected
surface, because external surface is exposed to collisions
among carriers and against reactor walls; so the effective
specific surface is only a protected one. First biofilm
growth on carriers requires some weeks; bacteria

Carriers can be introduced in MBBR in variable amounts: filling degree is the ratio
between the carriers’ apparent volume and the tank volume, and it can vary from zero to
a maximum value that depends on the carriers’ characteristics. With higher filling degree,
total biofilm surface and pollutant removal efficiency increase, but higher mixing energy
is required. The most widespread carriers are made of polyethylene or polypropylene,
their density is about 0.95, and usual filling degrees’ range is 30–60%; the
characteristics of some kinds of carriers produced by AnoxKaldnesTM Company are listed
in table 1.

Possible configurations

MBBR can be applied for wastewater treatment in several plant configurations:

1. pure MBBR biofilm before an activated sludge plant: this solution is common for
concentrated wastewater treatment;

2.upgrading of overloaded activated sludge plants by conversion into hybrid MBBR;

3.tertiary biological treatment by pure biofilm MBBR after an activated sludge plant;

4.complete biological treatment by series of MBBR: pre-denitrification, oxidation,

nitrification, post-denitrification.

MBBR have been and are applied to treat municipal wastewater [5, 6, 7, 8, 9] and
industrial wastewater including paper mills [10, 11, 12], winery [13] and dairy [14]. This
paper deals with the results of some European full-scale plants with MBBR for paper mill
wastewater treatment.

Case studies

Industry nr. 1 produces about 18.000 m3d-1 wastewater

with 2.500–3.500 mg/L COD. The wastewater treatment
plant (picture 1) is made of a coarse screen, a primary
settler, a fine screen, a cooling system, dosage of
Plant outline of Industry nr. 1 nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus salts), a biological
section and a final clarifloculation. The biological section
has a first aerated pure biofilm MBBR with 2.500 m3 volume filled with 40% NatrixTM – O
carriers, an activated sludge oxidation tank with 7.500 m3 volume and sludge
concentration 4-6 kgSSTm-3, and a secondary settler. The plant must remove at least

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90% of COD, 99% of BOD5; maximum pollutant concentrations in final effluent are: TSS
< 50 mg/L, tot-N < 4.7 mg/L, P < 0.3 mg/L.

On average basis, the plant has treated an effective organic load of 59.000 kgCODd-1, the
first MBBR has removed 51% of COD and the following activated sludge oxidation tank
has removed 75% of remaining COD; the whole plant has removed 90% COD and has
always respected emission limits.

Industry nr. 2 produces about 18.000 m3d-1 wastewater

with 2.000-2.500 mg/L COD. The wastewater treatment
plant (picture 2) is made of a cooling system, dosage of
nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus salts), pH correction
Plant outline of Industry nr. 2 and a biological section. The biological section is made of
two serial aerated pure biofilm MBBR with 1.900 m3
volume each filled with 20% NatrixTM – O carriers, an activated sludge oxidation tank
with 10.000 m3 volume and sludge concentration 2-5 kgSSTm-3, and a final settler. The
plant must remove at least 70% COD, 50% total nitrogen and 50% total phosphorus;
moreover, maximum TSS concentration in final effluent is 30 mg/L.

On average basis, the plant has treated an effective organic load of 38.000 kgCODd-1, the
two MBBR have removed 35% COD, the whole plant has removed 70% COD and has
always respected emission limits.

Industry nr. 3 produces 2.800 m3d-1 wastewater 800-

1.300 mg/L COD. The wastewater treatment plant
(picture 3) is made of an equalization tank with 600 m3
volume, a primary settler (with fiber recovery), dosage of
Plant outline of Industry nr. 3 nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus salts) and a biological
section. The biological section is made of a pure biofilm
aerated MBBR with 500 m3 volume filled with 68%
AnoxKaldnesTM – K1 carriers, and a secondary settler with polyelectrolyte dosage.
Maximum pollutant concentrations in final effluent are: TSS < 35 mg/L, COD < 160
mg/L, BOD5< 40 mg/L.

On average basis, the biological section has treated an effective organic load of 2.660
kgCODd-1, and has removed 90% COD; the final effluent has always respected emission
limits.

Industry nr. 4 produces about 7.200 m3d-1 wastewater

with 2.000–3.500 mg/L COD. The wastewater treatment
plant (picture 4) is made of a primary flotation tank (with
fiber recovery), an equalization tank with 1.000 m3
Plant outline of Industry nr. 4
volume, nutrient dosage (nitrogen and phosphorus salts)
and a biological section. The biological section is made of
a first pure biofilm aerated MBBR with 1400 m3 volume filled with 70% AnoxKaldnesTM –
K3 carriers (which is the maximum filling degree), an activated sludge oxidation tank
with 3.000 m3 volume and a secondary settler. Final effluent must respect maximum
pollutant concentration limits: TSS < 35 mg/L, COD < 160 mg/L, BOD5< 40 mg/L.

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On average basis, the biological section has treated an effective organic load of 17000
kgCODd-1; the MBBR tank has removed 75% COD, the whole biological section has
removed 96% COD and the final effluent has always respected emission limits.

Conclusions

Results reported in this paper show that MBBR are a suitable technology to treat paper
mill industry wastewater with high organic substance removal efficiency. They can be
applied with several plant configurations; in general, for paper mill wastewater, plants
are made of primary treatments (sedimentation, flotation, often also equalization), a first
pure biofilm aerated MBBR that removes part of COD, an oxidation tank which can be an
activated sludge reactor or a second MBBR, and final solids’ separation system that can
be a settler, a flotation tank or a clarifloculation. As reported in literature, also anaerobic
MBBR have been applied to treat paper mill industry wastewater.

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