J. Fierro

Hydrogen production: Two stage processes for waste degradation

The dark fermentation process generates hydrogen by biological means. It presents two main advantages: fulfilling requirements for mild operational conditions and gaining benefit from the residual biomass. The process itself may be seen as a pre-treatment step in a complete stabilisation chain, with the aim of attaining the valorisation of residual biomass. However, increasing the yield of H2 production is an imperative task. In this manuscript, a review of recent work in the field of fermentative hydrogen production is presented. As dark fermentation has a maximum yield of 33% (on sugars), a description is also presented of possible second stage processes for the degradation of dark fermentation effluents. Alternatives considered were photofermentation and bioelectrochemical systems (BES) as processes capable of converting fermentation sub-products into H2. Anaerobic digestion as a final stabilisation stage was also considered owing to the wide application of this technology in the treatment of bio-wastes.

Feasibility of anaerobic co-digestion of poultry blood with maize residues.

The potential of anaerobic digestion for the treatment of poultry blood was evaluated in batch assays at laboratory scale and in a mesophilic semi-continuously fed digester. The biodegradability test performed on poultry blood waste showed a strong inhibition. Maize residues were used as co-substrate to overcome inhibition thanks to nitrogen dilution. Under batch operation, increasing the maize concentration from 15% to 70% (volatile solids (VS) basis) provided an increase of biogas from 130±31 to 188±21 L CH4/kg VS. In the semi-continuous mesophilic anaerobic digester, the biogas yield was 165±17 L CH4/kg VS fed, as a result of strong volatile fatty acid (VFA) accumulation. Although physical modifications of maize particles were observed by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), an incomplete degradation was confirmed from analysis of digestates. Furthermore, Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy analysis demonstrated that along with VFA build-up, an accumulation of non-degraded materials took place.

Valorisation of used cooking oil sludge by codigestion with swine manure

The addition of lipid wastes to the digestion of swine manure was studied as a means of increasing biogas production. Lipid waste was obtained from a biodiesel plant where used cooking oil is the feedstock. Digestion of this co-substrate was proposed as a way of valorising residual streams from the process of biodiesel production and to integrate the digestion process into the biorefinery concept. Batch digestion tests were performed at different co-digesting proportions obtaining as a result an increase in biogas production with the increase in the amount of co-substrate added to the mixture. Semi-continuous digestion was studied at a 7% (w/w) mass fraction of total solids. Co-digestion was successful at a hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 50 d but a decrease to 30 d resulted in a decrease in specific gas production and accumulation of volatile and long chain fatty acids. The CH4 yield obtained was 326 ± 46 l/kg VSfeed at an HRT of 50 d, while this value was reduced to 274 ± 43 l/kg VSfeed when evaluated at an HRT of 30 d. However these values were higher than the one obtained under batch conditions (266 ± 40 l/kg VSfeed), thus indicating the need of acclimation to the co-substrate. Despite of operating at low organic loading rate (OLR), measurements from respirometry assays of digestate samples (at an HRT of 50 d) suggested that the effluent could not be directly applied to the soil as fertiliser and might have a negative effect over soil or crops.

Biohydrogen production from lactose: influence of substrate and nitrogen concentration.

Hydrogen produced from renewable sources may be considered the energy vector of the future. However, reducing process costs is imperative in order to achieve this goal. In the present research, the effect of nitrogen (N), initial pH and substrate content for starting up the dark fermentative process was studied using the response surface methodology. Anaerobic digested dried sludge (biosolid pellets) was used as the inoculum. Synthetic wastewater was used as the substrate in batch reactors. A decrease in H2 production was observed with the increase in N and lactose concentrations. This drop was considerably greater when the concentration of lactose was at its lower level. Although the increase in lactose concentration results in a lower H2 production, the effect of N on the response is attenuated at higher levels of lactose. On the other hand, the effect of initial pH on the fermentation system was not significant. The evaluation on the process under semi-continuous conditions was performed using anaerobic sequencing batch reactors (ASBRs). The process was evaluated at different C/N ratios using synthetic wastewater. Results showed higher hydrogen yields with the gradual decrease in nitrogen content. The addition of cheese whey to the ASBR resulted in a H2 production rate of 0.18 L H2 L−1 d−1.