Biogas production from sugar rich waste
Latvia University of Agriculture, Faculty of Engineering, Institute of Energetics, Cakstes blvd 5, LV 3001 Jelgava, Latvia;
*Correspondence: vilisd@inbox.lv
Abstract:
56 biogas plants are working today in Latvia. There is need to investigate the suitability of various biomasses for energy production. Sweets production factories by-products are organic waste and wastewater featuring a high sugar content. Wastewater have a high chemical oxygen demand (COD) level and requires special treatment that results in additional input of energy and financial resources.
This article shows the results of two studies evaluating sugar-containing biomass suitability for the production of biogas.
The anaerobic digestion process of damaged jam and sweets factory wastewater was investigated for biogas production in 0.75 L digesters, operated in batch mode at temperature 38 ± 0.1 °C. The average biogas yield per unit of organic dry matter (ODM) from digestion of damaged jam was 1.114 L g-1ODM and methane yield was 0.716 L g-1ODM. Average biogas yield from digestion of sweets production factory wastewater was 1.058 L g-1ODM and methane yield was 0.663 L g-1ODM. All investigated sugar rich wastes can be utilised for biogas production successfully thus providing an environmental solution for wastewater problem of sweets production factories.
Key words:
anaerobic digestion, biogas, methane, sugar rich wastes