R&D - Project

ALBAPRO Completed

Combined algae-bacteria process for low-energy wastewater treatment

The objective of the ALBAPRO project was the technical utilization of mixed microalgae-bacteria systems to treat municipal and industrial effluents and produce biomass for subsequent valorization.

The objective of the ALBAPRO project was the technical utilization of mixed microalgae-bacteria systems to treat municipal and industrial effluents and produce biomass for subsequent valorization. The use of algae for energy and biofuel production, as a raw material, or for reducing greenhouse gases, has attracted significant interest from researchers. In this context, the appeal of using algae-bacteria consortia to benefit from the advantages of easy and inexpensive biomass settling is becoming increasingly important. The conventional treatment of effluents from the paper industry and most other industrial sectors is biological purification. Biological wastewater treatment through bacterial activity alone is state-of-the-art in Europe due to operational costs that are still lower than many commercially available technologies. However, biological effluent treatment still consumes a lot of energy and is unpopular with the producing industry due to undesirable costs that do not cover the core business of the producing industry. Multiple advanced effluent treatment technologies (evaporation, membrane filtration, oxidation, precipitation, etc.) have been researched for several years. Unfortunately, most of these technologies require high investments and have even higher operating costs. SMEs, in particular, can hardly afford to implement highly sophisticated effluent treatment concepts to improve the quality of their effluents.