ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Artificial Neural Network Predictions of Up-Flow
Anaerobic Sludge Blanket (UASB) Reactor
Performance in the Treatment of Citrus Juice
Wastewater
Moiz Elnekave1, Suna Ozden Celik2, Melkon Tatlier1, Nese Tufekci3
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1Department of Chemical Engineering, Istanbul Technical University,
34469, Maslak, Istanbul, Turkey
2Department of Environmental Engineering, Corlu Engineering Faculty, Namik Kemal University,
59860, Corlu, Tekirdağ, Turkey
3Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Istanbul University,
34320 Avcilar, Istanbul, Turkey
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2012;21(1):49-56
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
The operation of a full-scale up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor treating citrus juice
wastewater was observed for two years. The average total chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efficiency
was determined to be equal to 79% and 77%, for the first and second years of operation for this reactor,
respectively. The average volumetric loading rate was equal to 8.1 and 5.7 kg COD/m3day, respectively, during
these periods. Three artificial neural network (ANN) models, namely feed forward back propagation
(FFBP), radial basis function-based neural networks (RBF), and generalized regression neural networks
(GRNN) were utilized to predict the COD and total suspended solid (TSS) concentrations in the effluent leaving
the UASB reactor as well as the biogas production in the reactor. In general, the FFBP model made the
best predictions with an average deviation of about 6.4-15.6% from the experimental values. The predictions
made for biogas production and COD concentration were more accurate, while relatively larger discrepancies
existed for the TSS concentration. The utilization of the ANN models generally provided significant improvements
when compared to the use of multilinear regression for the same purpose.