Emission of odorous volatile organic compounds from a municipal manure treatment plant and their removal using a biotrickling filter

Abstract

Odorous volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from municipal manure treatment facilities are considered as a major nuisance issue for operators and nearby residents. In this study, up to 71 odorous VOCs were detected by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry at the manure treatment plant. These compounds can be classified into five different categories, including alkanes, olefins, aromatics, volatile organosulphur compounds and terpenes. Toluene, dimethyl disulphide, dimethyl sulphide, xylene and ethylbenzene were the five most abundant pollutants. A pilot-scale biotrickling filter (BTF) was employed to treat the complex odorous gases. Correlation analysis showed that the removal efficiency (RE) of the BTF was related with the molecular weight and chemical structure of contaminants. Higher than 85% of REs could be reached for aromatic, terpenes and most alkanes compounds after 180 days of operation. Comparatively, most olefins and partial alkanes compounds with a molecular weight lower than 70 were not removed easily. The REs of these compounds ranged from 0% to 94%, and the average removal efficiency (RE) was only about 33.3%.

Keywords:

• odorous
• manure
• volatile organic compounds (VOCs)
• biotrickling filter
• complex gases

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Science and Technology project of Guangzhou, China (no. 2011J4200074), Science and Technology project of Guangdong province, china (no. 2012B091000160) and the Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 31270169).