ABSTRACT

Primary treatment of sugar industry effluent includes filtration, sedimentation, and load equalization, whereas secondary treatments are biological methods like lagoons, aerated ponds, upflow anaerobic sludge blanket, expanded granular sludge blanket, and fluidized bed reactor. Combined anaerobic and aerobic treatments are also used for sugar industry effluent treatment. Screening, grit removal, flow equalization, sedimentation, or dissolved air flotation are used to reduce suspended solid load from sugar industry effluent. Biological treatment methods are applied for the reduction of soluble organic matter and disinfections. Sugar industry effluent mostly contains sugars and volatile fatty acids that are easily biodegradable; therefore, all the biological treatment processes are suitable. Anaerobic treatment method for concentrated effluent, in terms of pollutants, is a widely used method in industries. It has several advantages over aerobic processes, which include the lesser energy required; methane production due to the degradation of organic matters, which is a source of energy; and lesser sludge production, which indirectly reduces sludge disposal costs greatly.