Olive Mill Wastewater: From a Pollutant to Green Fuels, Agricultural Water Source and Bio-Fertilizer—Part 1. The Drying Kinetics

Mejdi Jeguirim, Patrick Dutournié, Antonis A. Zorpas and Lionel Limousy
Additional contact information
Mejdi Jeguirim: Institut de Sciences des Matériaux de Mulhouse, UMR 7661 CNRS, 15 rue Jean Starcky, 68057 Mulhouse, France
Patrick Dutournié: Institut de Sciences des Matériaux de Mulhouse, UMR 7661 CNRS, 15 rue Jean Starcky, 68057 Mulhouse, France
Antonis A. Zorpas: Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, Environmental Conservation and Management, Lab of Chemical Engineering and Engineering Sustainability, Cyprus Open University, Giannou Kranidioti 33, 2252 Latsia, Nicosia, Cyprus
Lionel Limousy: Institut de Sciences des Matériaux de Mulhouse, UMR 7661 CNRS, 15 rue Jean Starcky, 68057 Mulhouse, France

Energies, 2017, vol. 10, issue 9, 1-16

Abstract: Olive Mill Wastewater (OMWW) treatment is considered to be one of the main challenges that Mediterranean countries face. Although several procedures and technologies are mentioned in the literature, these techniques have several disadvantages or have been limited to laboratory pilot validation without posterior industrial projection. Recently, an advanced environmental friendly strategy for the recovery of OMWW was established involving the impregnation of OMWW on dry biomasses, drying of these impregnated samples, and finally green fuels and biochar production. This established strategy revealed that the drying step is crucial for the success of the entire recovery process. Hence, two impregnated samples were prepared through OMWW impregnation on sawdust (IS) and olive mill solid waste (ISW). The drying kinetics of OMWW and impregnated samples (IS and ISW) were examined in a convective dryer (air velocity range from 0.7–1.3 m/s and the temperature from 40–60 °C). The experimental results indicated that the drying of the impregnated samples occurred twice as fast as for the OMWW sample. Such behavior was attributed to the remaining thin layer of oil on the OMWW surface Furthermore, the Henderson and Pabis model showed the suitable fit of the drying curves with a determination coefficient R 2 above 0.97. The drying rates were extracted from the mathematical models and the drying process was analyzed. The coefficient of effective diffusivity varied between 2.8 and 11.7 × 10 ?10 m 2 /s. In addition, the activation energy values ranged between 28.7 and 44.9 kJ/mol. These values were in the same range as those obtained during the drying of other agrifood byproducts. The final results could be very helpful to engineers aiming to improve and optimize the OMWW drying process.

Keywords: olive mill wastewater; biomass; impregnation; drying kinetics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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