It is known that palm oil is one of the top selling raw materials that are widely used in both food and non-food industries. It is also widely used as a feedstock for biofuel production. However, the palm oil industry produces a huge amount of effluent that normally contains undesirable contaminants and suspended solids (SS), with high chemical oxygen demand (COD) and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) values. Hence, it is imperative to ensure the sustainable management of palm oil production and to prevent serious environmental pollution. Various techniques are available to treat palm oil mill effluent (POME). This review summarizes the compilation of articles published in the period of 2010 to 2020 that focused on the development of treatment techniques for POME. Academic databases including Scopus, ScienceDirect, Web of Science, and PubMed were used to search for related articles. This review discusses the performance and highlights the optimum operating conditions for each chemical treatment technique. This review is not only relevant to researchers who work on the advancement and innovation of remediation technologies for POME, but it is also significant for researchers who deal closely with environmental pollution, water resource management, environmental protection, and flora and fauna conservation.
Keywords: oil palm; palm oil mill effluent; wastewater treatment; water treatment technologies; environmental pollution
*Corresponding author: Tel.: (+60)1548797320
E-mail: azlan.kamari@fsmt.upsi.edu.my
