Methane production from glucose and fatty acids at 55?85�C: Adaption of cultures and effects of pCO2

Effect of substrate and cation requirement on anaerobic volatile fatty acid conversion rates at elevated biogas pressure

This work studied the anaerobic conversion of neutralized volatile fatty acids (VFA) into biogas under Autogenerative High Pressure Digestion (AHPD) conditions. The effects of the operating conditions on the biogas quality, and the substrate utilisation rates were evaluated using 3 AHPD reactors (0.6 L); feeding a concentration of acetate and VFA (1-10 g COD/L) corresponding to an expected pressure increase of 1-20 bar. The biogas composition improved with pressure up to 4.5 bar (>93% CH4), and stabilized at 10 and 20 bar. Both, acetotrophic and hydrogenotrophic methanogenic activity was observed. Substrate utilisation rates of 0.2, 0.1 and 0.1 g CODCH4/g VSS/d for acetate, propionate and butyrate were found to decrease by up to 50% with increasing final pressure. Most likely increased Na(+)-requirement to achieve CO2 sequestration at higher pressure rather than end-product inhibition was responsible.

Influence of bicarbonate buffer on the methanogenetic pathway during thermophilic anaerobic digestion

To investigate the influence of bicarbonate on the metabolic pathway of methanogenesis, different concentrations of bicarbonate (0-0.2 mol/L) were applied during thermophilic anaerobic digestion of 2.5 and 5 g/L glucose. The stable carbon isotopic results demonstrated that, as the bicarbonate concentration increased, the proportion of total CH4 generated from hydrogenotrophic methanogenesis generally increased. Furthermore, methane production rates and acetate degradation rates were seriously reduced under high levels of bicarbonate (0.15 and 0.2 mol/L). Meanwhile, carbon isotope fractionation was more prominent in treatments with 5 g/L glucose than that of 2.5 g/L glucose. Increased concentrations of bicarbonate altered the dominant methanogens and bacteria and increased the microbial diversity. The inhibitory effects of high concentrations of bicarbonate suggested that bicarbonate should be used cautiously as a buffer salt in anaerobic processes, especially when methanogenetic pathways were studied.