Enhanced dissolved methane recovery and energy-efficient fouling mitigation via membrane vibration in anaerobic membrane bioreactor

This work successfully developed a novel vibrating AnMBR (VAnMBR) and investigated its long-term performance, fouling control and energy recovery compared to the conventional biogas-sparging AnMBR (BSAnMBR). The VAnMBR achieved better organics removal compared to the BSAnMBR due to the lower content of biopolymers in its effluents. Moreover, the VAnMBR retarded the early TMP rise to alleviate membrane fouling efficaciously with 49.7%-80.2% lower fouling rates than the BSAnMBR. Reduced amounts of nano-particles were consistently observed in the supernatants of the VAnMBR, revealing its benefits to restrict fouling sources for better fouling control. Importantly, the VAnMBR could save 81.9%-94.1% energy of the BSAnMBR and enhance 11.1%-35.0% biogas recovery resulting from minimised dissolved methane, inducing more net energy production during wastewater treatment. The favourable performance of the VAnMBR makes it a promising technology to replace the conventional wastewater treatment plant as a next-generation resource recovery facility.

Automated summary

This study successfully developed a novel vibrating AnMBR (VAnMBR) and compared its performance with the conventional biogas-sparging AnMBR (BSAnMBR) in terms of organics removal, fouling control, and energy recovery. The VAnMBR achieved better organics removal and lower fouling rates, leading to significant energy savings and increased biogas recovery compared to the BSAnMBR.