Autores:
Alexandre Narcizo da Silva
Juliana Bortoli Mees
Ramiro José Espinheira Martins
The olive pomace oil extraction industry (OPOEI) has shown significant growth, with an average of 4% annually since 2019, indicating its economic importance in the European Union (EU). Consequently, this industry generates large amounts of wastewater, approximately 1 m 3 /ton of processed olive pomace, corresponding to about 5.4 million m 3 /year worldwide. Industrial wastewater has a high content of suspended solids, pungent odor, high turbidity, low biodegradability, high organic content, mainly Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), increased range of phenolic compounds, dark color, and antibacterial properties, making biological treatment difficult, because of its low biodegradability, toxicity to most microorganisms, and acidic pH (3-6). The composition of olive mill wastewater is complex. Usually, conventional treatments do not have a positive effect on the removal of pollutants.
