Bioresource Technology 121 (2012) 3135

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Bioresource Technology
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/biortech

Antibiotic Fermentation Broth Treatment by a pilot upow anaerobic sludge

bed reactor and kinetic modeling
T. Coskun a,, H.A. Kabuk a, K.B. Varinca a, E. Debik a, I. Durak b, C. Kavurt c
a

Environmental Engineering Department, Yildiz Technical University, 34220 Esenler, Istanbul, Turkey
Deva Kartepe API Production Plant, 41135 Kocaeli, Turkey
c
Hidromer Aritma Sistemleri Ltd. Sti., 41040 Kocaeli, Turkey
b

h i g h l i g h t s
" Anaerobic fermentation broth could be efciently treated by upow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor.
" The highest chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efciency was obtained as 95.7%.
" The highest methane production rate was 0:30 Lmethane g1
CODremoved .
" The results of the study were interpreted using the various kinetic models.
" The results showed a close relationship with all kinetic models used.

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 17 May 2012
Received in revised form 27 June 2012
Accepted 28 June 2012
Available online 7 July 2012
Keywords:
Anaerobic treatment
Antibiotic fermentation broth wastewater
Kinetic model
UASB

a b s t r a c t
In this study, an upow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) mesophilic reactor was used to remove antibiotic fermentation broth wastewater. The hydraulic retention time was held constant at 13.3 days. The
volumetric organic loading value increased from 0.33 to 7.43 kgCOD m3 d1 using antibiotic fermentation
broth wastewater gradually diluted with various ratios of domestic wastewater. A COD removal efciency of 95.7% was obtained with a maximum yield of 3,700 L d1 methane gas production. The results
of the study were interpreted using the modied StoverKincannon, rst-order, substrate mass balance
and Van der Meer and Heertjes kinetic models. The obtained kinetic coefcients showed that antibiotic
fermentation broth wastewater can be successfully treated using a UASB reactor while taking COD
removal and methane production into account.
2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Antibiotic production is a signicant portion of the pharmaceutical industry. In the past, antibiotics were obtained from a variety
of bacteria and fungi. Currently, antibiotics can be produced from
natural or synthetic chemicals. One of the most important methods
of antibiotic production is passing fermentation broth containing
clavulanic acid through membrane systems to separate out impurities (Brites Alves et al., 2002). The portion that fails to pass the
ultraltration membrane is referred to as the waste of the fermentation broth. A review of the literature indicates that there is no
study regarding the disposal of these wastes, and they pose important problems for the industries producing the raw materials for
antibiotics in Turkey. These wastes cause damage to the natural
environment, due to the content of hardly biodegradable organic
materials. For this reason, studies on the treatment of these wastes
Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 2123835379; fax: +90 2123835356.
E-mail address: tcoskun@yildiz.edu.tr (T. Coskun).
0960-8524/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2012.06.102

are required. Upow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactors

have not been used in the pharmaceutical industry to treat this
type of waste, even though they have been successfully used for
other types of wastewater (Chen et al., 2011; Guo et al., 2012; Oktem et al., 2008; Satyanarayan et al., 2009). In this study, the treatment of antibiotic fermentation broth waste was examined using a
UASB reactor. The results of this study were applied to the modied StoverKincannon, rst-order, substrate mass balance and
Van der Meer and Heertjes kinetic models, and the kinetic coefcients obtained in this study were compared with those found in
the literature.

2. Methods
2.1. Anaerobic digester
A pilot UASB reactor with a volume of approximately 2 m3 was
used in this study. Wastewater was fed to the reactor on a daily ba-