Removal of isopropyl alcohol from air stream using biofiltration

Isopropyl Alcohal (IPA) is flammable, clear, colorless liquid and is slightly odorous. IPA has wide applications in various industries such as paint, pharmaceutical, lithography, rubber manufacture, semiconductor, and printing industries. It is one of the components of many antiseptic and cosmetic products. The exposure of high concentrations of IPA can cause depression in central nervous system, unconsciousness and possibly death. Due to its adverse effects on human being and the environment, there is a dire need for cost effective and innovative treatment technique that can be used for the removal of IPA from industrial effluent streams. Out of various physical and chemical methods (adsorption, absorption, condensation, incineration, etc.) available, biological methods such as biofiltration plays a major role in treatment of IPA. Biofiltration is cost effective method and create negligible secondary pollutants. Biofiltration is an aerobic degradation of organic compounds onto supporting media which include the utilization of VOCs as a carbon source (food) by variety of microorganism’s community. The present study deals with the biofiltration of IPA. The biofiltration study is carried out on a lab scale for 40 days using acclimated mixed culture. The duration of acclimation phase is obtained as 10 days. The removal efficiency obtained after the acclimation phase is 91.25% which indicates the sufficient growth of microbial culture in the biofilter column. The performance of the biofilter column is evaluated in next 30 days by keeping different inlet loads of IPA (0.101 – 0.365 g m) at different air flow rates ranging from 0.18 to 0.3 m h. To check the stability of biofilter column, the biofilter is operated under shock loading conditions for 10 days by varying inlet IPA load and air flow rate after every 3 days.