Possibilities of decontaminating organic waste from swine-farming complexes using anaerobic digestion

Abstract

Anaerobic digestion with simultaneous production of biogas is one of the most common methods of recycling, processing and decontamination of organic waste to produce alternative fuels. A commonly used indicator of the sanitary safety of the substrate is eggs of Ascaris suum nematodes of pigs, which are characterised by extremely high resistance to environmental factors. The aim is to investigate the effect of the mesophilic mode of anaerobic digestion on the activity of pathogens, particularly Ascaris suum eggs. The eggs of the studied nematode species were placed in a biogas installation at a temperature of 37 °C. The digestate samples with eggs were then taken every 4 days for 28 days, followed by larvae culture to determine the viability of the eggs. The results of our research have shown that the mesophilic regime of anaerobic digestion is an effective method of controlling parasites, but at the same time, it needs to be improved, since only 7.6% of A. suum eggs remained alive after a 1-day stay, about 50% after the week stay and about 9% in the third week stay in the biogas reactor. Thus, further optimisation of anaerobic fermentation in the mesophilic mode can be aimed at improving the suppression of pathogenic activity.