Microbubbles size distribution at different palm oil mill effluent (POME) temperatures for oil recovery study

Palm Oil Mill Effluent (POME) is the largest contributor of biomass from
the palm oil milling industry. Conventional method of POME treatment
using ponding system should be improved because of huge land resource
requirement. In this study, microbubbles technology was applied to
understand the recovery rate of residual oil from POME at different
operating temperatures. Temperature for POME wasset at 27 o
C, 30 o
C and
50 o
C to determine the microbubble size distributions and characteristics at
different POME temperature. At each temperature, the size of microbubbles
was measured based on six size range; <10 μm, (11-20) μm, (21-30) μm,
(31-40) μm, (41-50) μm and >50 μm. The results showed that at different
temperatures, the microbubbles size distribution varies and the smallest
group of microbubbles(<10μm) was generated at 50o
C. According to StokeEinstein
equation, at higher temperature, smaller size of microbubbles is
generated because of the gas diffusion factor into liquid.