WASTE AND BIOMASS MANAGEMENT & VALORIZATION Simultaneous biofiltration of H 2 S and NH 3 using compost mixtures from lignocellulosic waste and chicken manure as packing material Diana Vela-Aparicio 1,2 & Daniel F. Forero 3 & Mario A. Hernández 4 & Pedro F. B. Brandão 2 & Iván O. Cabeza 3 Received: 17 April 2020 /Accepted: 10 September 2020 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020 Abstract Biofiltration offers an efficient and economical alternative for the elimination of offensive odors caused by hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, and volatile organic compounds. Considering that packing materials affect the performance and represent the main installation cost, the purpose of this work was to evaluate the biofiltration of H 2 S and NH 3 comparing three composted mixtures made from chicken manure and lignocellulosic residues (pruning waste, sugarcane bagasse, and rice husk) used as packing material. A range of gas concentrations similar to those of a municipal WWTP was used in the biofiltration of a contaminated stream performed on a laboratory scale. The results indicate that at low concentrations of H 2 S (6–36 ppm) and NH 3 (0–1 ppm), the three biofilters showed 100% removal efficiency. Now, at the maximum levels of gas concentrations of H 2 S (250 ppm) and NH 3 (19 ppm) while the removal efficiency of H 2 S remained higher than 90% in all cases, the removal efficiency of NH 3 remained higher than 90% only in the sugarcane bagasse biofilter. Compost mixtures with sugarcane bagasse and rice husk are highly reliable as packing material for biofiltration at high concentration of H 2 S. Specifically, the sugarcane bagasse mixture had the highest removal efficiency (99% H 2 S and 95% NH 3 ) and the highest elimination capacity (15 g H 2 S/m 3 h and 0.6 g NH 3 /m 3 h), making it a better option for the elimination of both gases. These results represent a contribution to the construction of a low-price elimination system of offensive odors in WTTPs and other industries. Keywords Biofiltration . Compost . Lignocellulosic wastes . Packing materials . Hydrogen sulfide . Ammonia Introduction Wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) are considered signifi- cant sources of gaseous emissions, including offensive odors and greenhouse gases (Alfonsín et al. 2015). The main com- pounds that produce odor in a WWTP are volatile compounds of sulfur such as hydrogen sulfide (H 2 S), nitrogen compounds such as ammonia (NH 3 ), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) (Easter et al. 2005; Barbusinski et al. 2017). These gases are emitted in livestocks and composting plants; they also represent a form of air pollution since they cause discom- fort to the population and damage to health or the environment (Revah and Morgan-Sagastume 2005; Lebrero et al. 2011). There are a variety of technologies to reduce these emissions and to comply with air quality regulations such as chemical scrubbing and adsorption, but these technologies produce sec- ondary products that require additional treatment. Instead, bio- technologies require low capital and operating costs and are environmentally friendly compared with physicochemical technologies. Among the available biotechnologies, biofiltration is the most commonly used for the treatment of H 2 S and NH 3 in WWTPs and in composting plants due to its ease of implementation, low cost, and diversity of designs and studies (Lebrero et al. 2014; Barbusinski et al. 2017). In a biofilter, gaseous emissions pass through a wet porous bed made of different packing materials; then, gases are diffused into the aqueous phase of a biofilm containing microorgan- isms for contaminant degradation (Devinny and Ramesh Responsible editor: Philippe Garrigues * Diana Vela-Aparicio dgvelaa@unal.edu.co 1 Instituto de Biotecnología, Universidad Nacional de Colombia - Sede Bogotá, Bogotá D.C., Colombia 2 Departamento de Química, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional de Colombia - Sede Bogotá, Bogotá D.C., Colombia 3 Facultad de Ingeniería Ambiental, Universidad Santo Tomás, Bogotá D.C., Colombia 4 Departamento de Ingeniería Ambiental, Universidad EAN, Bogotá D.C., Colombia Environmental Science and Pollution Research https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-10817-w