Effect of ultrasonication on anaerobic degradability of solid waste digestate
•The effect of sonication on digestibility of lignocellulosic residues was studied.•Sonication was applied as a post-treatment of food waste digestate.•Sonication positively affected the residual methanogenic potential of the digestate.•The maximum biogas production exceeded that of the unsonicated...
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Published in | Waste management (Elmsford) Vol. 48; pp. 209 - 217 |
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Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
United States
Elsevier Ltd
01.02.2016
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | •The effect of sonication on digestibility of lignocellulosic residues was studied.•Sonication was applied as a post-treatment of food waste digestate.•Sonication positively affected the residual methanogenic potential of the digestate.•The maximum biogas production exceeded that of the unsonicated substrate by 30%.
This paper evaluates the effect of ultrasonication on anaerobic biodegradability of lignocellulosic residues. While ultrasonication has been commonly applied as a pre-treatment of the feed substrate, in the present study a non-conventional process configuration based on recirculation of sonicated digestate to the biological reactor was evaluated at the lab-scale. Sonication tests were carried out at different applied energies ranging between 500 and 50,000kJ/kg TS. Batch anaerobic digestion tests were performed on samples prepared by mixing sonicated and untreated substrate at two different ratios (25:75 and 75:25 w/w). The results showed that when applied as a post-treatment of digestate, ultrasonication can positively affect the yield of anaerobic digestion, mainly due to the dissolution effect of complex organic molecules that have not been hydrolyzed by biological degradation. A good correlation was found between the CH4 production yield and the amount of soluble organic matter at the start of digestion tests. The maximum gain in biogas production was 30% compared to that attained with the unsonicated substrate, which was tentatively related to the type and concentration of the metabolic products. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0956-053X 1879-2456 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.wasman.2015.10.031 |