Abstract

Most of the leather industries in Ethiopia discharge their effluent partially or without any treatment to the nearby water bodies. This creates a serious effect on aquatic biota and surrounding environment due to its high organic loading and chromium content. To minimize the effect, tannery wastewater should be treated before the effluent is discharged to the environment. Therefore, the main objective of the study was to use a two stage laboratory scale Anaerobic Sequence Batch Digester (Reactor) in order to investigate the potential of composite tannery wastewater to produce biogas. Two Stage Anaerobic Sequence Batch Digester was used because it has a conducive environment for micro-organisms at different temperature. The present study characterized composite tannery wastewater with respect to biogas production parameters. Four sets of conditions were investigated: Mesophilic to mesophilic; thermophilic to thermophilic; mesophilic to thermophilic and thermophilic to mesophilic in the hydrolysis/acidification and methanogenesis stages (reactors), respectively. The Organic Loading Rate (OLR) was ranged between 9.58 and 10.28 kg COD/m³ day throughout the study. The highest volume of biogas (7232 ml) and content of methane (69.75%) was in the thermophilic‑thermophilic phase. The removal efficiency of total solid (TS) and volatile solids (VS) of all digesters were in the range of 52 to 69 and 58 to 81%, respectively, treatment of composite tannery wastewater by a two stage Anaerobic Sequence Batch Digester (Reactor) (ASBR) produces high amount of methane at thermophilic - thermophilic phase and the lowest produced in mesophlic- mesophlic phase. Digesters in mesophilic-thermophilic (D₃) produced higher biogas and biogas quality than digesters with thermophilic- mesophlic (D₄) ones.

Key words: Anaerobic sequential batch reactor, wastewater to energy, tannery wastewater management.