Cultivation of Chlorella protothecoides in anaerobically treated brewery wastewater for cost-effective biodiesel production

• DOI: 10.1007/s00449-014-1292-4
• Publication Date: 2014-09-30T12:03:42Z
• Authors: Cornelius Darpito; Won-Sub Shin; Seungjib Jeon; Hansol Lee; Kibok Nam; Jong-Hee Kwon; Ji-Won Yang
• Keywords: 0106 biological sciences; Biofuels; Food Industry; Chlorella; Wastewater; 01 natural sciences; 7. Clean energy; 6. Clean water; NUTRIENT REMOVAL; SPIRULINA SP; MICROALGAE; GROWTH; BIOMASS; CO2; PH; Water Purification; 12. Responsible consumption

The use of wastewater has been investigated to overcome the economic challenge involved with a production of microalgae-based biodiesel. In this study, to achieve economical biodiesel production along with effective wastewater treatment at the same time, anaerobically treated brewery wastewater (ABWW) was utilized as a low-cost nutrient source, in the cultivation of Chlorella protothecoides. About 96 and 90 % of total nitrogen and phosphorus in ABWW were removed, respectively, while C. protothecoides was accumulating 1.88 g L(-1) of biomass. The C. protothecoides grown in ABWW showed increases in cell size and cell aggregation, resulting in a near 80 % enhanced harvesting efficiency within 20 min, as compared with only 4 % in BG-11. In addition, the total fatty acid content of the C. protothecoides grown in ABWW increased by 1.84-fold (35.94 ± 1.54 % of its dry cell weight), relative to that of BG-11.