Biological removal of methanol from process condensate for the purpose of reclamation

The biological removal of methanol from condensate of ammonia manufacturing processes for the purpose of reclamation using contact type reactor was studied. Methanol of 60 mg/L was removed completely under an HRT of 1.12 h. Optimal inorganic nutrient dose was determined on evaluating methanol removal performance and dehydrogenase activities (DHA) under different nutrition doses. The optimal inorganic nutrient dose only gave an increase of conductivity of ca. 10μs/cm^2 in the effluent on treating synthetic condensate containing methanol of 30mg/L. The results demonstrated that biological removal of methanol was effective for the purpose of recovering the methanol-bearing condensate.