F u e l s , C h e m i c a l s a n d M e t a l s f r o m B i o p r o c e s s e s

4975195

A P P A R A T U S A N D M E T H O D F O R P R O C E S S I N G T R A P W A S T E S

A N D T H E L I K E

William G Urbani assigned to Industrial Service Corporation

A method and apparatus for processing trap waste and the like into its component solids and liquids treatable in a sewage treatment plant in- cludes a cooker, a solids separation system, and a digester. The cooker liquifies and renders trap waste obtained from, for example, restaurant traps by maintaining the waste at an elevated temperature and an elevated pressure to sterilize and separate the trap waste into solid and non- solid portions thereof. The solid separation sys- tem removes the solid and particulate matter from the liquified trap waste for disposal, pre- ferably after washing the solids with treated water from the sewage treatment plant. The separated non-solid portion of the rendered trap waste is then communicated to a digester for either aerobic or anaerobic degradation; the digest is thereafter treated to remove additional solids. The remainder of the treated trap pum- pings can then be processed in a sewage treat- ment plant with munipal or industrial sewage. Gases and vapors escaping the trap waste are recovered and cleaned by condensation, scrub- bing, and/or incineration prior to release to the atmosphere.

4981592

A N A E R O B I C D I G E S T I O N W I T H A D D I T I O N O F E N Z Y M E S

John T Garbutt, Claire L Smith assigned to Grain Processing Corporation

Addition of alkaline proteolytic enzymes derived from Bacillis licheniformis in the anaerobic stage of bacterial digestion processes to improve the settling properties of the bacterial biomass.

4981593

S E W A G E T R E A T M E N T

Anthony Priestley, Mark A Woods, Elstern- wick, Australia assigned to Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

The sewage treatment process combines physico-chemical clarification using fine material or clay particles with anaerobic diges- tion of a concentrated sewage. The particles are preferably magnetite. The sewage (10) is mixed with magnetite (12) having a hydroxylated sur- face layer in tanks (14, 16, 18, 20) in which acid, inorganic flocculant and polyelectrolyte may be added if necessary. The organic material in the sewage is adsorbed on the particles during the mixing contact and a clarified liquid effluent (28) is separated from the loaded particles in a clarifier (22), The organic material may be separated from the particles before or after treat- ment in an anaerobic digestion assembly (36). The particles are preferably cleansed and regenerated in a two stage countercurrent flow washing system (38, 40, 58, 60, 62) into which a dilute solution of caustic soda or lime (32) is in- troduced.

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