Search results for "Photobioreactor"
showing 10 items of 35 documents
Improving membrane photobioreactor performance by reducing light path: operating conditions and key performance indicators
2020
[EN] Microalgae cultivation has been receiving increasing interest in wastewater remediation due to their ability to assimilate nutrients present in wastewater streams. In this respect, cultivating microalgae in membrane photobioreactors (MPBRs) allows decoupling the solid retention time (SRT) from the hydraulic retention time (HRT), which enables to increase the nutrient load to the photobioreactors (PBRs) while avoiding the wash out of the microalgae biomass. The reduction of the PBR light path from 25 to 10 cm increased the nitrogen and phosphorus recovery rates, microalgae biomass productivity and photosynthetic efficiency by 150, 103, 194 and 67%, respectively.The areal biomass product…
Water resource recovery by means of microalgae cultivation in outdoor photobioreactors using the effluent from an anaerobic membrane bioreactor fed w…
2016
[EN] With the aim of assessing the potential of microalgae cultivation for water resource recovery (WRR), the performance of three 0.55 m3 flat-plate photobioreactors (PBRs) was evaluated in terms of nutrient removal rate (NRR) and biomass production. The PBRs were operated outdoor (at ambient temperature and light intensity) using as growth media the nutrient-rich effluent from an AnMBR fed with pre-treated sewage. Solar irradiance was the most determining factor affecting NRR. Biomass productivity was significantly affected by temperatures below 20 °C. The maximum biomass productivity (52.3 mg VSS·L−1·d−1) and NRR (5.84 mg NH4-N·L−1·d−1 and 0.85 mg PO4-P·L−1·…
Nitrite inhibition of microalgae induced by the competition between microalgae and nitrifying bacteria
2020
[EN] Outdoor microalgae cultivation systems treating anaerobic membrane bioreactor (AnMBR) effluents usually present ammonium oxidising bacteria (AOB) competition with microalgae for ammonium uptake, which can cause nitrite accumulation. In literature, nitrite effects over microalgae have shown controversial results. The present study evaluates the nitrite inhibition role in a microalgae-nitrifying bacteria culture. For this purpose, pilot- and lab-scale assays were carried out. During the continuous outdoor operation of the membrane photobioreactor (MPBR) plant, biomass retention time (BRT) of 2 d favoured AOB activity, which caused nitrite accumulation. This nitrite was confirmed to inhib…
Kinetic modeling of autotrophic microalgae mainline processes for sewage treatment in phosphorus-replete and -deplete culture conditions
2021
[EN] A kinetic model of autotrophic microalgal growth in sewage was developed to determine the biokinetic processes involved, including carbon-, nitrogen- and phosphorus-limited microalgal growth, dependence on light intensity, temperature and pH, light attenuation and gas exchange to the atmosphere. A new feature was the differentiation between two metabolic pathways of phosphorus consumption according to the availability of extracellular phosphorus. Two scenarios were differentiated: phosphorus-replete and -deplete culture conditions. In the former, the microalgae absorbed phosphorus to grow and store polyphosphate. In the latter the microalgae used the stored polyphosphate as a phosphoru…
Production of microalgal external organic matter in a Chlorella-dominated culture: influence of temperature and stress factors
2020
[EN] Although microalgae are recognised to release external organic matter (EOM), little is known about this phenomenon in microalgae cultivation systems, especially on a large scale. A study on the effect of microalgae-stressing factors such as temperature, nutrient limitation and ammonium oxidising bacteria (AOB) competition in EOM production by microalgae was carried out. The results showed non-statistically significant differences in EOM production at constant temperatures of 25, 30 and 35 degrees C. However, when the temperature was raised from 25 to 35 degrees C for 4 h a day, polysaccharide production increased significantly, indicating microalgae stress. Nutrient limitation also see…
Wastewater nutrient removal in a mixed microalgae-bacteria culture: effect of light and temperature on the microalgae-bacteria competition.
2018
[EN] The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of light intensity and temperature on nutrient removal and biomass productivity in a microalgae¿bacteria culture and their effects on the microalgae¿bacteria competition. Three experiments were carried out at constant temperature and various light intensities: 40, 85 and 125¿µE¿m¿2¿s¿1. Other two experiments were carried out at variable temperatures: 23¿±¿2°C and 28¿±¿2°C at light intensity of 85 and 125¿µE¿m¿2¿s¿1, respectively. The photobioreactor was fed by the effluent from an anaerobic membrane bioreactor. High nitrogen and phosphorus removal efficiencies (about 99%) were achieved under the following operating conditions: 85¿125¿µE¿…
Reflection-refraction effects on light distribution inside tubular photobioreactors
2017
One of the main parameters affecting autotrophic algae cultures is photon absorption distribution inside the photobioreactor. This clearly depends on the geometry of both the radiation source and the photobioreactor, as well as on algae suspension optical properties. In this work the local volumetric rate of photon absorption LVRPA in a cross-section of a horizontal-pipe photobioreactor was investigated by means of simplified Monte Carlo simulations. In particular, the fate of a number of photons perpendicularly hitting the photobioreactor circular section was simulated in relation to different values of algae concentration. The model takes into account refraction/reflection phenomena at th…
Model performance of partial least squares in utilizing the visible spectroscopy data for estimation of algal biomass in a photobioreactor
2018
[EN] Spectroscopy technology and statistical methods (Partial Least Squares) have been integrated to develop a model that allows estimating the microalgal biomass in a photobioreactor. The model employing PLS combines the absorption spectrum measurements in the visible range (400-750 nm) with a microalgae cell density in a water sample. First, a calibration model was constructed using a calibration data set, and then, the predictive capacity of the model was determined by cross validation. Finally, an external validation of the predictive performance of the model was carried out with an independent data set. To test the accuracy of the model it was applied to different culture conditions yi…
MODELLING OF THE GROWTH OF NANNOCHLOROPSIS GADITANA IN DIFFERENT REACTOR GEOMETRIES, EXPERIMENTAL KINETIC PARAMETERS FROM BATCH CULTURES AND BIOCHEMI…
2022
Microalgae are unicellular and photosynthetic microorganisms that grow using inorganic salts, CO2 and light, and are applied in numerous industrial sectors due to their variety and properties. Due to the lack of information on how microalgae respond to external inputs and to the different environments in which they grow, today the industrial application is not exploited as it should. It is therefore necessary to create models that allow to predict microalgal growth in different photobioreactors to improve our knowledge, still poorly investigated. In this work the Monod equation for the specific growth rate was combined with the Lambert-Beer law for the non-homogeneous light distribution in …
Mixotrophy in a Local Strain of Nannochloropsis granulata for Renewable High-Value Biomass Production on the West Coast of Sweden
2022
A local strain of Nannochloropsis granulata (Ng) has been reported as the most productive microalgal strain in terms of both biomass yield and lipid content when cultivated in photobioreactors that simulate the light and temperature conditions during the summer on the west coast of Sweden. To further increase the biomass and the biotechnological potential of this strain in these conditions, mixotrophic growth (i.e., the simultaneous use of photosynthesis and respiration) with glycerol as an external carbon source was investigated in this study and compared with phototrophic growth that made use of air enriched with 1–2% CO2. The addition of either glycerol or CO2-enriched air stimulated the…