Studies with an anaerobic expanded bed reactor comparing the performances achieved with synthetic waste and domestic sewage

The performance of an anaerobic expanded bed reactor has been examined during the treatment of a synthetic low strength waste whose consistency and composition were constant. The organic loading rates used were in the range 0.2–5 kg total organic carbon m^?3 day^?1 and the removal efficiencies varied from 89 to 52%. Comparing these results with those obtained previously for the treatment of domestic sewage, whose strength and composition was very variable, showed that not only can higher removal efficiencies be achieved with the synthetic waste but also that a significantly better (R² > 0.85, as opposed to <0.5) correlation between data could be obtained. This indicates the potential danger of using synthetic feedstocks for the prediction of reactor performance under real conditions.