Separation and recovery of organic acids from fermented kitchen waste by an integrated process

• Main Authors: Omar, Farah Nadia, Abdul Rahman, Nor'aini, Hafid, Halimatun Saadiah, Phang, Lai Yee, Hassan, Mohd Ali
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Academic Journals 2009
• Online Access: http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/16670/1/16670.pdf; http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/16670/; http://www.academicjournals.org/journal/AJB/article-abstract/A8777188619

Organic acids produced from anaerobic digestion of kitchen waste were recovered using a new integrated method which consisted of freezing and thawing, centrifugation, filtration and evaporation. The main organic acid produced was lactic acid (98%). After the freezing and thawing process, 73% of the total suspended solids were removed and the organic acids were elevated from 59.0 to 70 g/L. The evaporation technique was used to further concentrate the organic acids up to 224 g/L. Using the integrated recovery method, the reduction of the total suspended solids in the solution achieved was about 93%. The material balance for the recovery process was also presented.