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Experimental Report, Period 9-12/2017, Project: Electrocoagulation Unit for Microalgal Biomass Separation.
Brányiková, Irena ; Vojtěchovský, R. ; Čermáková, Lenka
Production of microalgae in the world is increasing every year, but their use in food, cosmetics, feed and biofuel production is still limited by the high production price and high energy input. The substantial part of the energy costs lies in the separation of algal biomass from the medium, which is most often performed on plate centrifuges. The harvest concentration of algal suspensions in most cultivation systems ranges between just 1-5 g/L. Therefore, to obtain 1 kg of dry biomass, it is necessary to remove 200 to 1000 liters of water (by centrifuging and then drying). This amount of water and thus the energy input can be reduced via flocculation added as a pre-step prior to centrifugation. Electrofloculation is type of floculation, where the flocculant is directly formed by dissolving the electrodes. Suitable electrode material and parameter set enable obtaining of biomass, which is not contaminated by chemical flocculants and meets requirements for food stuff. The main objective of this project is to develop a continuous electroflocculation device suitable for these purposes.\n
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