The effect of acid pretreatment on the anaerobic digestion and dewatering of waste activated sludge

Desmond Devlin; Alan Guwy; Sandra Esteves; Richard Dinsdale

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043

The effect of acid pretreatment on the anaerobic digestion and dewatering of waste activated sludge

Desmond Devlin, Alan Guwy, Sandra Esteves, Richard Dinsdale

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Abstract Waste activated sludge (WAS) is difficult to degrade in anaerobic digestion systems and pretreatments have been shown to speed up the hydrolysis stage. Here the effects of acid pretreatment (pH 6-1) using HCl on subsequent digestion and dewatering of WAS have been investigated. Optimisation of acid dosing was performed considering digestibility benefits and level of acid required. Pretreatment to pH 2 was concluded to be the most effective. In batch digestion this yielded the same biogas after 13 days as compared to untreated WAS at 21 days digestion. In semi-continuous digestion experiments (12 day hydraulic retention time at 35°C) it resulted in a 14.3% increase in methane yield compared to untreated WAS, also Salmonella was eradicated in the digestate. Dewatering investigations suggested that the acid pretreated WAS required 40% less cationic polymer addition to achieve the same cake solid content. A cost analysis was also carried out. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	4076 - 4082
Number of pages	6
Journal	Bioresource Technology
Volume	102
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043
Publication status	Published - 21 Dec 2010

Keywords

biosolids
methane yield
oxitop
pretreatment
waste activated sludge

Access to Document

10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

Cite this

@article{b81d936e07014f0c8c0d98ab16071959,

title = "The effect of acid pretreatment on the anaerobic digestion and dewatering of waste activated sludge",

abstract = "Abstract Waste activated sludge (WAS) is difficult to degrade in anaerobic digestion systems and pretreatments have been shown to speed up the hydrolysis stage. Here the effects of acid pretreatment (pH 6-1) using HCl on subsequent digestion and dewatering of WAS have been investigated. Optimisation of acid dosing was performed considering digestibility benefits and level of acid required. Pretreatment to pH 2 was concluded to be the most effective. In batch digestion this yielded the same biogas after 13 days as compared to untreated WAS at 21 days digestion. In semi-continuous digestion experiments (12 day hydraulic retention time at 35°C) it resulted in a 14.3% increase in methane yield compared to untreated WAS, also Salmonella was eradicated in the digestate. Dewatering investigations suggested that the acid pretreated WAS required 40% less cationic polymer addition to achieve the same cake solid content. A cost analysis was also carried out. Copyright {\textcopyright} 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.",

keywords = "biosolids, methane yield, oxitop, pretreatment, waste activated sludge",

author = "Desmond Devlin and Alan Guwy and Sandra Esteves and Richard Dinsdale",

year = "2010",

month = dec,

day = "21",

doi = "10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043",

language = "English",

volume = "102",

pages = "4076 -- 4082",

journal = "Bioresource Technology",

publisher = "Elsevier",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - The effect of acid pretreatment on the anaerobic digestion and dewatering of waste activated sludge

AU - Devlin, Desmond

AU - Guwy, Alan

AU - Esteves, Sandra

AU - Dinsdale, Richard

PY - 2010/12/21

Y1 - 2010/12/21

N2 - Abstract Waste activated sludge (WAS) is difficult to degrade in anaerobic digestion systems and pretreatments have been shown to speed up the hydrolysis stage. Here the effects of acid pretreatment (pH 6-1) using HCl on subsequent digestion and dewatering of WAS have been investigated. Optimisation of acid dosing was performed considering digestibility benefits and level of acid required. Pretreatment to pH 2 was concluded to be the most effective. In batch digestion this yielded the same biogas after 13 days as compared to untreated WAS at 21 days digestion. In semi-continuous digestion experiments (12 day hydraulic retention time at 35°C) it resulted in a 14.3% increase in methane yield compared to untreated WAS, also Salmonella was eradicated in the digestate. Dewatering investigations suggested that the acid pretreated WAS required 40% less cationic polymer addition to achieve the same cake solid content. A cost analysis was also carried out. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

AB - Abstract Waste activated sludge (WAS) is difficult to degrade in anaerobic digestion systems and pretreatments have been shown to speed up the hydrolysis stage. Here the effects of acid pretreatment (pH 6-1) using HCl on subsequent digestion and dewatering of WAS have been investigated. Optimisation of acid dosing was performed considering digestibility benefits and level of acid required. Pretreatment to pH 2 was concluded to be the most effective. In batch digestion this yielded the same biogas after 13 days as compared to untreated WAS at 21 days digestion. In semi-continuous digestion experiments (12 day hydraulic retention time at 35°C) it resulted in a 14.3% increase in methane yield compared to untreated WAS, also Salmonella was eradicated in the digestate. Dewatering investigations suggested that the acid pretreated WAS required 40% less cationic polymer addition to achieve the same cake solid content. A cost analysis was also carried out. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

KW - biosolids

KW - methane yield

KW - oxitop

KW - pretreatment

KW - waste activated sludge

U2 - 10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043

DO - 10.1016/j.biortech.2010.12.043

M3 - Article

C2 - 21236662

VL - 102

SP - 4076

EP - 4082

JO - Bioresource Technology

JF - Bioresource Technology

ER -

The effect of acid pretreatment on the anaerobic digestion and dewatering of waste activated sludge

Abstract

Keywords

Access to Document

Fingerprint

Cite this