Improving pollutants removal by microalgae Chlorella PY-ZU1 with 15% CO2 from undiluted anaerobic digestion effluent of food wastes with ozonation pretreatment

•Microalgae mutant with 15% CO2 was used to remove various pollutants from the UADEFW.•Ozonation pretreatment increased biomass yield and pollutants removal efficiency.•Removal efficiencies of COD, NH3-N and TP from the UADEFW increased to 68–99%.•Lipid content of microalgal biomass increased when UADEFW was pretreated with ozone. In order to purify various pollutants (3108mg COD/L, 2120mg NH3-N/L) in the undiluted anaerobic digestion effluent of food wastes (UADEFW), ozonation pretreatment was employed to improve pollutants removal by microalgae mutant Chlorella PY-ZU1 with 15% CO2. Ozonation pretreatment broke CC bonds and benzene rings of refractory organics such as unsaturated fatty acids and phenols in UADEFW and degraded them into low-molecular-weight organics such as methanoic acid and methanal, but excessive ozone induced the accumulation of toxic by-products. The microalgal growth rate and biomass yield markedly increased to the peaks of 456mg/L/d and 4.3g/L, respectively, when the UADEFW was pretreated with 2mg-O3/mg-C of ozone. The removal efficiencies of NH3-N, TP and COD reached 99%, 99% and 68%, respectively. The lipid and carbohydrate contents of microalgal biomass increased because of the relative lack of nitrogen when microalgae was cultured with 15% CO2 to purify the UADEFW with ozonation pretreatment.