Treatment of volatile organic compounds by biofiltration with and without percolation : kinetic and characterization studies

The objectives of this work are related to the kinetic study and characterization of air treatment biofilters with and without percolation which were packed with inert packing materials in order to treat methanol, ethanol and toluene vapours.The thesis is divided into three sections.The first section contains a bibliographic introduction to biofiltration and an experimental study.The review of experimental work shows that methanol, ethanol and toluene can be treated in biofilters with or without percolation. In the experimental study of this section, ethanol is treated in a biotrickling filter at low nitrogen concentrations in the nutrient solution and high removal efficiencies are obtained. In this study, experimental protocols for maintaining the biofilter and controlling the biomass content in the packing bed were developed.The second section is composed of two experimental studies for characterizing biofilters with and without percolation in order to treat methanol. A methodology for calculating the biomass accumulated in the packing bed of a biofilter is among the new experimental protocols developed in this study. In the case of biotrickling filter, methodologies for determining the partition coefficient of methanol and the biomass production rate were developed.The role of the biofilm and the nutrient solution on bioflter performance was also analyzed.The studies of this section lead to a better comprehension of methanol biodegradation in biofilters.The third section contains two kinetic studies for biofilters with and without percolation. In the first study, a new experimental methodology is proposed to calculate microkinetic parameters related to microbial growth in a biofilter. In the second study, the microkinetic and macrokinetic behaviors of methanol and toluene biodegradation are compared.The influence of operating conditions on microbial growth and elimination capacity is also analyzed. This study includes the identification of energy indicators of biofilters with and without percolation, which could be used in energy balances and for estimating the temperature of packing bed