Pilot-scale multi-purposes approach for volatile fatty acid production, hydrogen and methane from an automatic controlled anaerobic process

Dark fermentative volatile fatty acids production from food waste: A review of the potential central role in waste biorefineries

“…The same pilot-scale fermenter was used to produce H 2 and VFAs; the latter to be fed to a second anaerobic stage to produce methane (Micolucci et al, 2020). The reactor was operated for 300 days at 55°C, adopting an HRT of 3.3 days and an OLR of 19.0 kg TVS m −3 day −1 , and an original approach to pH control was implemented based on the recirculation of part of the digestate from the methanogenic reactor.…”

Multilinear Regression Model for Biogas Production Prediction from Dry Anaerobic Digestion of OFMSW

“…Nevertheless, the intrinsic variability of experimental results or inaccurate methodologies represent the main challenges to achieve high accuracy of the predictive models. In addition, predictive models mostly rely on laboratory scale data sets [28][29][30], while only few were developed based on pilot-scale tests or full-scale plants [31,[34][35][36]. However, it should be considered that predictive models build on data from pilot-scale experimental tests could provide useful information for the operational management of industrial facilities, similarly to what life cycle assessment analysis can do from an environmental perspective [37].…”

Enhancing volatile fatty acids (VFA) production from food waste in a two-phases pilot-scale anaerobic digestion process

“…From the metabolic point of view, the AD pathways can be divided into two main routes: the first is represented by the acidogenic fermentation, and the second is represented by the methanogenesis pathways. The knowledge of this combined process suggests the possibility to produce volatile fatty acids (VFA) and hydrogen from the first fermentative stage and methane from the second one; in practice by dividing the two different process in a two-stages configuration [8]. However, the AD plants that have been installed in Europe are almost in favour of the one stage [9], despite of the better connection of the two-stages AD with the biorefinery concept.…”

“…There are several risks which can compromise the efficiency of the anaerobic treatment of the organic wastes, especially if VFA production is one of the main objectives; among others, pH inhibition phenomena or metabolic changes of the fermentation process towards less appetite byproducts (such as lactic acid and alcohols) with negatively affected hydrogen and VFA production [8]. It is of primary importance to control and maintain the fermentation process parameters much stable as possible.…”

“…As main target, it is well known that the pH in the fermenter needs to be kept over 5.0 to promote the fermentative activity, but below 7.0 to avoid the proliferation of methanogenic bacteria [5]. In order to control the pH in the fermentation process and consequently favouring VFA production, the recirculation of the digested effluent from the methanation stage of a two-stages AD process has been recently investigated as an eco-friendly solution [8]. The buffering capacity of the anaerobic digestated is connected to its alkalinity.…”