Anaerobic Digestion of Olive Oil Mill Effluents: Evaluation of Wastewater Organic Load and Phytotoxicity Reduction

Olive oil mill effluents (OME) are of great concern worldwide dueto their role as pollutants. This work studies, on a laboratoryscale, the possibility of reducing the polluting load of olivewastewaters (organic, acid and polyphenolic) through chemical-physical processes (sedimentation-filtration) followedby a biological treatment (anaerobic digestion). This is in orderto produce biogas and obtain an effluent suitable for applicationto the soil. The anaerobic process was followed by determiningchemical-physical parameters (pH, COD, N-NH₃, polyphenols).The extent of anaerobic digestion was evaluated throughmeasurements of biogas and volatile fatty acids and the microbialmetabolism was examined through dehydrogenase activity. Finally,tests of plant germination and growth were carried out usingdigested waters to determine if they could be used in agriculture.The study demonstrated that anaerobic digestion of OME firstreduced the organic load by 78-89% and the content of polyphenolsby 33-43%, and secondly produced biogas (mean value of methane83-85%). Phytotoxicity tests carried out on Lepidiumsativum seeds showed that the anaerobic treatment considerablyreduced the phyto-toxic character of OME.