Exploiting Olive Mill Wastewater via Thermal Conversion of the Organic Matter into Gaseous Biofuel—A Case Study

Alfredo Crialesi, Barbara Mazzarotta, Marco Santalucia, Fabrizio Di Caprio, Alfonso Pozio, Alessia Santucci and Luca Farina
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Alfredo Crialesi: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Chimica Materiali Ambiente, “Sapienza” Università di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy
Barbara Mazzarotta: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Chimica Materiali Ambiente, “Sapienza” Università di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy
Marco Santalucia: Azienda Della Toffola S.p.A., Via Feltrina, 72, 31040 Signoressa di Trevignano, Italy
Fabrizio Di Caprio: Dipartimento di Chimica, “Sapienza” Università di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy
Alfonso Pozio: ENEA-TERIN, C.R. Casaccia, Via Anguillarese 301, 00123 Roma, Italy
Alessia Santucci: ENEA-FSN, C.R. Frascati, Via Enrico Fermi, 45, 00044 Frascati, Italy
Luca Farina: ENEA-FSN, C.R. Frascati, Via Enrico Fermi, 45, 00044 Frascati, Italy

Energies, 2022, vol. 15, issue 8, 1-14

Abstract: Olive oil is one excellence of the Italian food industry: around 300 kt yr −1 are produced, creating roughly the same amount of olive mill wastewater (OMW) to be disposed of. The present work describes a process to exploit OMW by converting its organic compounds to valuable gaseous biofuel. A sample OMW was characterized (COD, TOC, solids, and polyphenols) and submitted to membrane filtration tests to concentrate the organic compounds. Based on the results of the experiments, a treatment process was outlined: the retentate streams from microfiltration and ultrafiltration steps were fed to a cracking and a steam reforming reactor, respectively; the obtained syngas streams were then mixed and sent to a methanation reactor. The process was simulated with Aspen Plus (AspenTech©) software, assessing operating conditions and streams compositions: the final biofuel is around 81 mol.% methane, 4 mol.% hydrogen, and 11 mol.% carbon dioxide. The permeate stream cannot be directly disposed of, but both its amount and its polluting charge are greatly reduced. The heat needed by the process, mainly due to the endothermic reactions, can be obtained by burning an amount of olive pomaces, roughly corresponding to one-third of the amount left by olive treatments giving rise to the processed OMW feed.

Keywords: olive mill wastewater; membrane filtration; biofuel; steam reforming; cracking; methanation (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: 2022
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