1092 | International Journal of Current Engineering and Technology, Vol.4, No.2 (April 2014) Research Article International Journal of Current Engineering and Technology E-ISSN 2277 – 4106, P-ISSN 2347 - 5161 ©2014 INPRESSCO ® , All Rights Reserved Available at http://inpressco.com/category/ijcet Application of Compact Jet Loop Reactor in Treatment of Industrial Waste Water from Pharmaceutical Industry Madhukar Subhash Patil Ȧ* and Ghayas A. Usmani Ḃ Ȧ Pratap Institute of Management & Technology, At Walki, Risod Road, Washim Dist: Washim 444505 (M.S.) India. Ḃ University Institute of Chemical Technology, North Maharashtra University, Bambhori, Jalgaon 425001 (M.S.) India. Accepted 15 April 2014, Available online 25 April 2014, Vol.4, No.2 (April 2014) Abstract Present study was carried out to investigate the application of Compact jet loop reactor in the waste water treatment by using activated sludge process. The tests were carried out in the laboratory with synthetic waste water and the effluent from pharmaceutical industry. A laboratory scale Compact jet loop reactor model comprising of an aeration tank and final clarifier was used for this purpose. The Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) and Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) of the influent and effluent collected from pharmaceutical industry was measured to find process efficiency at various mixed liquor volatile suspended solids (MLVSS) and hydraulic retention time (θ). The results of the study demonstrated that an efficiency of above 56% for COD and above 66% for BOD could be obtained for above waste sample collected from pharmaceutical industry in Compact jet loop reactor if the ASP is operated at an MLVSS concentration of 3000 mg/l keeping an aeration time of 1 hour. Keywords: Activated Sludge, Synthetic waste water (SWW), BOD, COD, Mixed Liquor Volatile Suspended Solids (MLVSS). Introduction 1 During the last decades, pollution problems reached to an extent that the balance entire ecosystem which is threatened. Water is the main target of pollution. Activated sludge process has been used most widely among biological wastewater treatment process. In the present study, treatment of waste water was carried out by using activated sludge process and investigated to reduce the level of pollution. Usually the extent of pollution is measured in terms of the Biological and Chemical Oxygen Demands (BOD and COD) as well as Suspended Solids (SS). Traditional wastewater treatment plants are based on the use of selected mixed microbial flocs using recycling of settled biomass, resulting in the development of high performance reactors by increasing biomass concentration inside the reactors (A. Fadvi et al, 2005). Some other developments in this technology have resulted in more efficient and compact reactors able to perform better treatment with shorter retention times. Some of these alternative technologies are based on fixed bed (P. Buffiere et al, 1995; M. Henze et al, 1993) fluidised bed (J. Iza, 1991) up-flow anaerobic sludge bed (UASB) (D. Daffonchio et al, 1998) and expanded bed (M. Perez et al, 1997) reactors and rotating biological contactors (L. Malandra et al, 2003). All of these use biomass flocs or *Corresponding author Madhukar Subhash Patil is working as Principal and Ghayas A. Usmani as Professor granules free or immobilized, as process catalysts, with the objective of increasing the biomass concentration inside the reactor for faster removal of organic matter. In the biological stage of waste water treatment plants, the dissolved organic pollutants (in the form of Carbon and hydrogen) are converted to sludge by microorganisms under addition of oxygen (aerobic) (E. A. Naundor et al, 1995). The type of equipment used for the secondary treatment is big aeration basins containing either diffused or surface aerators. Recently there has been a shift from conventional treatment basins with a water depth of 3-4 m to large-size tower reactors of height between 15 and 30 m like the “Turmbiologie” of Bayer AG, the Biohoch_ Reaktor of Hoechst AG, or the deep shaft process of ICI with water depths between 50 and 200m (M. Zolkarnik et al, 1981). These new developments have greatly reduced the ground surface required as well as the emission airborne pollutants as well as the air intake owing to better oxygen usage. The space-time yield, however, has not improved significantly and the separation of the sludge from the treated water still requires huge clarification or sedimentation tanks. The “Hubstrahlreaktor” proposed by Brauer and Sucker (H. Brauer et al, 1979) and the Compact reactor developed at the Technical University Clausthal (U. Wachsmann et al, 1984) demonstrate on the other hand a high space-time yield and improved sludge handling properties and thus may be regarded as high performance reactors with respect to the biological waste water treatment.