Investigation of the Treatment Efficiency of Biofilters In Terms of Odorous Gases Originated from Animal Breeding

Abstract

In the study, treatment of odorous waste gases emited from the cattle and sheep breeding facilities andpoultry farms which containing ammonia were investigated by means of biofilters. Biofilters are preferredfor odor control due to their low energy requirement and capital cost. For this purpose, bench scale batchreactors, were used to simulate the intermittent ventilation of animal barns. Ammonia/air mixtures used aspollution source were obtained by stripping the concentrated ammonium hydroxide via air and fed to twoserially connected biofilter modules. Compost produced from domestic solid waste and sawdust mixturewas used as a packing material in the filters. Factors affecting aerobic-biologic oxidation of ammonia inbiofilters were investigated for different loading rates. During the 130 days which including the acclimationperiod, 8 different loads were loaded in the range of 1.32-27 g NH3/m3.h and the average ammonia removalrate was found as 97.2% ± 1.8.