Comparative study on factors affecting anaerobic digestion of agricultural vegetal residues

Abstract

Background: Presently, different studies are conducted related to the topic of biomass potential to generate through anaerobic fermentation process alternative fuels supposed to support the existing fossil fuel resources, which are more and more needed, in quantity, but also in quality of so called green energy. The present study focuses on depicting an optional way of capitalizing agricultural biomass residues using anaerobic fermentation in order to obtain biogas with satisfactory characteristics.. The research is based on wheat bran and a mix of damaged ground grains substrates for biogas production. Results: The information and conclusions delivered offer results covering the general characteristics of biomass used , the process parameters with direct impact over the biogas production (temperature regime, pH values) and the daily biogas production for each batch relative to the used material. Conclusions: All conclusions are based on processing of monitoring process results, with accent on temperature and pH influence on the daily biogas production for the two batches. The main conclusion underlines the fact that the mixture batch produces a larger quantity of biogas, using approximately the same process conditions and input, in comparison to alone analyzed probes, indicating thus a higher potential for the biogas production than the wheat bran substrate. © 2012 Cioabla et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.