Enhanced volatile fatty acid degradation and methane production efficiency by biochar addition in food waste-sludge co-digestion: A step towards increased organic loading efficiency in co-digestion

Guneet Kaur, Davidraj Johnravindar, Jonathan W C Wong*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

68 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

This work investigated the effect of biochar addition to mitigate VFA accumulation and enhance methane production in mesophilic food waste/sludge co-digestion. Different types of biochar derived from agricultural and forestry residues at two pyrolysis temperatures were tested. Results showed that wheat straw biochar 550 °C supported the highest specific methane yield of 381.9 LCH4/kg VSadded and VS removal efficiency of 41.62% among all treatments. Degradation of propionic acid and long-chain fatty acids such as valeric, caproic and isovaleric acids was observed. This also corresponded to an increase in methanogenic favorable substrates including acetic acid (>40%) and butyric acid (~20%) over the control. Consequently, a 24% increase in overall methane production was obtained as compared to control. This demonstrated that biochar addition had positive effects on VFA degradation and methane production which could be a useful strategy to increase the organic loading in co-digestions without the fear of process failure.

Original languageEnglish
Article number123250
JournalBioresource Technology
Volume308
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jul 2020

Scopus Subject Areas

  • Bioengineering
  • Environmental Engineering
  • Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment
  • Waste Management and Disposal

User-Defined Keywords

  • Food waste
  • Mesophilic co-digestion
  • Organic loading
  • Syntrophic oxidation
  • VFA inhibition

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