Toward a functional integration of anaerobic digestion and pyrolysis for a sustainable resource management. Comparison between solid-digestate and its derived pyrochar as soil amendment

Monlau, Florian; Francavilla, Matteo; Sambusiti, Cécilia; Antoniou, N.; Solhy, Abderrahim; Libutti, Angela; Zabaniotou, Α.; Barakat, Abdellatif; Monteleone, Massimo

doi:10.1016/j.apenergy.2016.02.084

Cited by 157 publications

(60 citation statements)

References 57 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Situating anaerobic digesters near UA operations could facilitate the reuse of digestate (such as in Garfí et al 2011), saving on fertilizer requirements and reducing transportation costs for waste diversion. The coupling of AD with pyrolysis has the potential to produce biochar, which could be used to improve soil fertility (Monlau et al 2016). Excess heat from AD or pyrolysis can also be applied to the digester to or to district heating systems and can be used to heat houses or aquaculture operations.…”

Section: Exploiting Urban Resources For Local Agriculturementioning

confidence: 99%

Considerations for reducing food system energy demand while scaling up urban agriculture

Mohareb

Heller

Novak

et al. 2017

Environ. Res. Lett.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

There is an increasing global interest in scaling up urban agriculture (UA) in its various forms, from private gardens to sophisticated commercial operations. Much of this interest is in the spirit of environmental protection, with reduced waste and transportation energy highlighted as some of the proposed benefits of UA; however, explicit consideration of energy and resource requirements needs to be made in order to realize these anticipated environmental benefits. A literature review is undertaken here to provide new insight into the energy implications of scaling up UA in cities in high-income countries, considering UA classification, direct/indirect energy pressures, and interactions with other components of the food-energy-water nexus. This is followed by an exploration of ways in which these cities can plan for the exploitation of waste flows for resource-efficient UA.Given that it is estimated that the food system contributes nearly 15% of total US energy demand, optimization of resource use in food production, distribution, consumption, and waste systems may have a significant energy impact. There are limited data available that quantify resource demand implications directly associated with UA systems, highlighting that the literature is not yet sufficiently robust to make universal claims on benefits. This letter explores energy demand from conventional resource inputs, various production systems, water/energy trade-offs, alternative irrigation, packaging materials, and transportation/supply chains to shed light on UA-focused research needs.By analyzing data and cases from the existing literature, we propose that gains in energy efficiency could be realized through the co-location of UA operations with waste streams (e.g. heat, CO 2 , greywater, wastewater, compost), potentially increasing yields and offsetting life cycle energy demands relative to conventional approaches. This begs a number of energy-focused UA research questions that explore the opportunities for integrating the variety of UA structures and technologies, so that they are better able to exploit these urban waste flows and achieve whole-system reductions in energy demand. Any planning approach to implement these must, as always, assess how context will influence the viability and value added from the promotion of UA.

show abstract

Section: Exploiting Urban Resources For Local Agriculturementioning

confidence: 99%

Considerations for reducing food system energy demand while scaling up urban agriculture

Mohareb

Heller

Novak

et al. 2017

Environ. Res. Lett.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…These issues were avoided in co-combustion of dry digestate with wood at 50 wt% [11]. Pyrolysis of digestate was investigated in laboratory scale [12][13][14]. Coupling anaerobic digestion with pyrolysis generates several bioenergy carriers such as: biogas and biomethane from AD; biochar, bio-oil, and raw gas from pyrolysis.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Air gasification of digestate and its co-gasification with residual biomass in a pilot scale rotary kiln

Freda

Nanna

Villone

et al. 2019

Int J Energy Environ Eng

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this study energy recovery of digestate from a biogas plant was investigated via air gasification. Gasification tests were executed in a pilot scale rotary kiln plant having a nominal biomass feeding rate of about 20 kg/h. The equivalence ratio was varied from 0.22 to 0.39 with the goal to approach the autothermal condition. Tests were carried out for 5 h in steady state condition. Syngas composition, char and gas yields were measured. To improve the cold gas efficiency of the process, a mixture of digestate and almond shells (60:40 wt%) was gasified. Autothermal condition was reached with the mixture using equivalence ratio of 0.30 where the corresponding cold gas efficiency achieved the maximum value of 55%. The raw gas had a lower heating value of 4-5 MJ/Nm 3. To evaluate possible improvements in the produced gas properties, in this work the effect of steam injection was also investigated.

show abstract

“…Biochar can exert a significant influence on the leaching of soluble elements from the soil [6,7]. Biochar is a carbon-rich, solid by-product obtained from agricultural and forestry biomasses pyrolysis [8][9][10][11]. As soil amendment, biochar provides a potential soil carbon sequestration to mitigate global climate change [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil Amendment with Biochar Affects Water Drainage and Nutrient Losses by Leaching: Experimental Evidence under Field-Grown Conditions

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Leaching of soluble elements from cultivated soils is a major concern to meet the target of agricultural sustainability in most areas. The effect of biochar application to a cultivated soil on water drainage and the consequent solute losses was assessed during a trial carried out over two consecutive growing seasons. Biochar was added to a loam-texture soil, at 0, 1, and 2% d.w. rates. A lysimeter-like set-up arranged in the experimental field-unit, allowed collecting the percolating water. Two multiple linear regressions (ANCOVA models) were applied to detect biochar effect on: (1) The seasonal amount of drained water; and (2) the concentration of solutes in the drained water. The statistical comparison among a set of slope coefficients as affected by treatments (growing season and biochar) was used as modelling approach. The lower biochar application rate (1%) significantly reduced both the amount of drained water and its concentration in solutes. Conversely, the higher biochar application rate (2%) showed no significant effects. Nitrate and chloride showed a significant interaction with biochar application rates. Higher biochar application increased nitrate leaching while reduced that of chloride. Biochar application within a rate no more than 1% resulted in a useful and quite effective technical operation.

show abstract

Toward a functional integration of anaerobic digestion and pyrolysis for a sustainable resource management. Comparison between solid-digestate and its derived pyrochar as soil amendment

Cited by 157 publications

References 57 publications

Considerations for reducing food system energy demand while scaling up urban agriculture

Considerations for reducing food system energy demand while scaling up urban agriculture

Air gasification of digestate and its co-gasification with residual biomass in a pilot scale rotary kiln

Soil Amendment with Biochar Affects Water Drainage and Nutrient Losses by Leaching: Experimental Evidence under Field-Grown Conditions

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About