Challenges and An Implementation Framework for Sustainable Municipal Organic Waste Management Using Biogas Technology in Emerging Asian Countries

Techno-economic analysis of biogas production from domestic organic wastes and locally sourced material: the moderating role of social media based-awareness

Management of organic waste addresses the issue of cleanliness and sanitation in developing nations such as Pakistan, where improper waste management usually leads to significant health problems and early mortality. The control of organic waste in rural regions of Pakistan and other developing nations needs to be undertaken using effective solutions. This study contributes to satisfying local needs such as cooking, lighting, and maintaining a comfortable temperature in anaerobic locations and works as a guideline for converting to biogas. This research aims to ascertain households' most substantial challenges concerning biogas production using domestic organic waste and locally sourced materials. The analysis is conducted on data from 81 respondents gathered using a comprehensive questionnaire assessment. Respondents were carefully chosen with the purposive sampling process. Primary data were collected from a structured questionnaire and partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to evaluate the formulated assumptions. The results indicate that managing organic waste positively influences the sustainable improvement of biogas using human organic waste and locally resourced materials. The selected variables and their moderating effect significantly and favorably influence this conceptual model. Furthermore, all manipulating influences are constructively connected with implementing biogas technology using organic waste and locally resourced material, minimizing household energy expenses, and satisfying local needs. This study concludes that the government's green energy policy and economic incentives encourage households to use biogas energy produced from organic waste and locally resourced material. The government should use modern technology, resident training, and expert methodological assistance to induce households into biogas production using domestic organic waste and locally resourced material. Finally, the study's limitations and suggestions for further research are also addressed.

Zone-wise biogas potential in India: fundamentals, challenges, and policy considerations

The current manuscript focuses on the advancements made in establishing zone-based biogas plants in India from 1990 to the present. India generates various types of waste from agricultural, industrial, and human activities. Several methods are available to manage and derive energy from these waste materials, such as incineration, gasification, and anaerobic digestion (AD). Among these options, AD stands out as one of the most viable and environmentally friendly alternatives for biogas production, thanks to its low energy consumption. However, developing biogas plants in developing countries faces significant challenges, primarily due to governments' inadequate application of policy, financial, social, market, information, and technical constraints. To compile this information, data from various agencies in India have been gathered, revealing that 1.81 million biogas plants are currently installed in the West Zone, 1.48 million in the South Zone, 1.106 million in the North Zone, and 0.65 million in the East Zone. These biogas plants across the zones generate 7.02 lakh m3 per day. Additionally, 22 bio-CNG plants produce 84,759 kg/day of compressed biogas, and 201 waste plants generate 330.935 MW of electricity. Recently, the government has emphasized several initiatives, including GOBAR-DHAN, New National Biogas and Organic Manure, Sustainable Alternative Towards Affordable Transportation, and the waste-to-energy program. These initiatives aim to enhance the utilization of waste, promote cleanliness in villages and towns, and support the Swachh Bharat Mission and Atmanirbhar Bharat campaign, leading to tremendous overall success.

Modeling factors of biogas technology adoption: a roadmap towards environmental sustainability and green revolution

In a developing country such as Pakistan, adopting biogas technology is a complicated process. The government has taken several steps to address energy issues by increasing biogas facilities. This research seeks to identify the major barriers to the deployment of biogas plants. Respondents were selected using the snowball sampling method. As a result, 79 adopters of biogas plants participated. Utilizing a structured questionnaire, primary data were collected. Hypotheses were evaluated using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Study results demonstrate that all influencing factors are favorably associated with implementing biogas technology, minimizing energy crises, and achieving cost-cutting objectives. In addition, the findings show that properly reducing economic and governmental barriers, encourage farmers to use biogas plants productively and substantially. To build biogas facilities, the government should adopt an economic strategy, owner training, day-to-day operations, and professional technical assistance.

Current Status and Review of Waste-to-Biogas Conversion for Selected European Countries and Worldwide

Growing world population and increasing population density are leading to increasing waste production with biological waste amounting to several billion tonnes annually. Together with the increasing need for renewable energy sources, waste-to-biogas conversion as a prime example of waste-to-energy technology represents a facile way of solving two problems simultaneously. This review aims to address the recent progress in the field of waste-to-biogas technology, which is lately facing intensive research and development, and present the current status of this waste treatment method both in technological and legislative terms. The first part provides an overview of waste and waste management issues. This is followed by a detailed description of applicable waste-to-energy (WtE) technologies and their current implementation in selected European countries. Moreover, national energy and climate plans (NECPs) of selected EU Member States are reviewed and compared with a focus on implementation of WtE technologies. In a further section, biogas production from waste around the world is reviewed and compared country wise. Finally, an outlook into the future of WtE technologies is provided alongside the conclusions based upon the reviewed data.

Potential of Sustainable Concept for Handling Organic Waste in Tunisia

Nowadays, Tunisia is seeking to implement cost-efficient and sustainable solutions in relation to the treatment of organic waste which, at up to 65%, makes up the largest proportion of total waste generated in the country. Therefore, an efficient tool for decision makers is needed to provide a clear approach about the potential of organic waste as well as the treatment concept, which can be adapted based on technical requirements and local conditions. Results revealed that there is a high variation in terms of the nature of the collected biowaste, which affects the selection of the adopted bioprocess for each geographical zone of the study area. Three main categories of biowaste are produced along the coastline of Tunisia: food waste (FW) (102.543 t/a); green waste (GW) (1.326.930 t/a); and cattle manure (CM) (1.548.350 t/a). Based on the results of similar projects and laboratory-scale research work, anaerobic and aerobic digestion were examined. Regarding aerobic digestion, the monitoring of several physicochemical parameters ascertained that the co-composting of FW and GW at different ratios (GW: FW = 100:0, 75:25, 50:50, and 25:75) allowed the production of a stable and mature compost. A highly qualified end-product was generated from each trial categorized as a finished compost of class V with reference to German Standards of compost. Regarding the anaerobic process, different feedstock mixtures (FW:CM = 0:1, 1:1, 2:1, and 3:1) were prepared to feed semi-continuous anaerobic reactors. However, a significant improvement in the process development was recorded for digesters including a higher fraction of FW, which produced 0.846 LN/kg VSin as the maximum biogas production. Therefore, biological treatments of food waste and different co-substrates seems to be a suitable technique for Tunisia in terms of waste management, environmental, and energy aspects. However, the evaluation of the efficiency of the proposed biological treatments was also verified by a draw-up of a technical and economic feasibility analysis. Although the cost–benefit estimations proved that the profits from both the compost and biogas plants would be very modest, the feasibility of such sustainable projects should not only be evaluated on an economic basis, but also by taking into account socio-environmental considerations including decreasing environmental threats, providing work opportunities, increasing incomes, stimulating public awareness as well as reducing the operating costs linked to landfilling.

Transformation towards Circular Economy (CE) in Municipal Waste Management System: Model Solutions for Poland

Municipal waste management has been an area of special interest for the European Commission (EC) for many years, especially in the transformation process towards a circular economy (CE), which is a priority of the European Union’s (EU’s) economic policy. This paper presents the overview of the Polish waste management system (WMS) and the CE-related tasks indicated in the Polish CE Roadmap. Despite the fact that Poland is one of the countries that generates the least waste per capita (329 kg in 2018) in the EU (489 kg), it still has problems with adapting the levels of municipal waste recycling to European requirements (34.3% in 2018, EU average 47%), which result from the lack of sufficient infrastructure for waste management and the insufficiently developed public awareness and behaviors. The current paper presents an inventory of the recommended actions, which support transformation towards CE in municipal waste management. These actions have been grouped into six core principles of circularity, indicated in the ReSOLVE framework: Regenerate, Share, Optimize, Loop, Virtualize, and Exchange. In each of presented areas, recommended tasks and actions were identified that should be taken by governments and residents themselves, such as landfill remediation, use of selected municipal waste fractions for economic purposes, sharing products with co-users, waste recovery, remanufacturing products or components, virtual solutions in everyday life to reduce the amount of generated waste, or replacement of household appliances by items with a higher energy class. An implementation of specific actions indicated in the paper could positively influence transformation towards CE in Poland. Because the presented examples of actions are model solutions, they can also be used in other countries and regions.

The Impact of Exogenous Aerobic Bacteria on Sustainable Methane Production Associated with Municipal Solid Waste Biodegradation: Revealed by High-Throughput Sequencing

In this work, the impact of exogenous aerobic bacteria mixture (EABM) on municipal solid waste (MSW) is well evaluated in the following aspects: biogas production, leachate analysis, organic waste degradation, EABM population, and the composition of microbial communities. The study was designed and performed as follows: the control bioreactor (R1) was filled up with MSW and the culture medium of EABM and the experimental bioreactor (R2) was filled up with MSW and EABM. The data suggests that the composition of microbial communities (bacterial and methanogenic) in R1 and R2 were similar at day 0, while the addition of EABM in R2 led to a differential abundance of Bacillus cereus, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus saprophyticus, Staphlyoccus xylosus, and Pantoea agglomerans in two bioreactors. The population of exogenous aerobic bacteria in R2 greatly increased during hydrolysis and acidogenesis stages, and subsequently increased the degradation of volatile solid (VS), protein, lipid, and lignin by 59.25%, 25.68%, 60.47%, and 197.62%, respectively, compared to R1. The duration of hydrolysis and acidogenesis in R2 was 33.33% shorter than that in R1. At the end of the study, the accumulative methane yield in R2 (494.4 L) was almost three times more than that in R1 (187.4 L). In addition, the abundance of acetoclasic methanogens increased at acetogenesis and methanogenesis stages in both bioreactors, which indicates that acetoclasic methanogens (especially Methanoseata) could contribute to methane production. This study demonstrates that EABM can accelerate organic waste degradation to promote MSW biodegradation and methane production. Moreover, the operational parameters helped EABM to generate 20.85% more in accumulative methane yield. With a better understanding of how EABM affects MSW and the composition of bacterial community, this study offers a potential practical approach to MSW disposal and cleaner energy generation worldwide.