Technical Bulletin No. 0095: Anaerobic Digestion of Pulp and Paper Wastes

Over the last ten years a vast amount of research effort has been expended by the Council and others to adopt anaerobic decomposition to various pulp and paper mill wastes. The attached bulletin is a summary of all this work, which was prepared by Mr. Herbert F. Berger, Project Leader of the Council's program at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. From all these studies, which included the anaerobic digestion of semi-chemical liquors, strawboard wastes, and concentrated white water effluents, it does not appear that the process can be operated at a sufficiently high efficiency to consider its application to these effluent problems. The major difficulties appear to arise through the formation of sulfides in the digester, which inhibit decomposition. At best, the BOD loadings and reductions obtained by this process are not comparable to those that can be realized through other methods, in all probability at lower capital investment.