Biogas

About: Biogas is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 28571 publications have been published within this topic receiving 498545 citations.

Effects of different manuring systems with and without biogas digestion on nitrogen cycle and crop yield in mixed organic dairy farming systems

Abstract: Field trials were carried out between 2002 and 2005 to investigate the effects of biogas digestion in a mixed organic dairy farming system with arable land and grassland on nutrient cycling, nitrogen (N) uptake and crop yields within a cropping system comprising a whole crop rotation. Five treatments were carried out: (i) solid farmyard manure, (ii) undigested liquid slurry, (iii) digested liquid slurry, (iv) digestion of liquid slurry and field residues such as crop residues and cover crops, and (v) similar to iv, but with additional N inputs at the equivalent of 40 kg N ha−1 farmland through digestion of purchased substrates. The term “manure” is used in the present study to mean all kind of aboveground organic residues left on the field (“immobile manures”, such as crop residues and green manures incorporated directly into the soil) or added as stable wastes or effluents of biogas digestion (“mobile manures”). The total aboveground biomass growth and the overall aboveground N uptake of non-legume maincrops were higher in the liquid slurry manure treatment than in the solid farmyard manure system (+5% and +9%, respectively). The digestion of the liquid slurry increased N uptake and crop yields only after soil incorporation of the slurry shortly after field spreading. The additional collection and digestion of field residues such as cover crops and crop residues, combined with a reallocation of the effluents, strongly increased the amounts of “mobile” manure, allowing a more focussed allocation of the available N. This led to an increase in the aboveground N uptake (+12%) and biomass yield (+4%) of the five non-legume crops, due to a better adapted allocation of nutrients in space and time. Results obtained with spring wheat showed that removal of cover crops in autumn, and their digestion, combined with subsequent use as manure in spring resulted in a better synchronisation of the crop N demand and the soil N availability, in comparison with a strategy where the biomass was left on the field as green (immobile) manure. The inclusion of external substrates led to a further increase of 8% in N uptake, but not to a significant increase in aboveground dry matter yields.

Thermal pretreatment to improve methane production of Scenedesmus biomass

Abstract: Research into the development of renewable and sustainable fuels has been a major concern during last decades. Microalgae, as a potential resource, have gained great attention for energy purposes. In this context, anaerobic digestion seems to be the most direct energy generation process. Nevertheless, the efficiency of this process is hampered due to the hard cell wall of some microalgae. In order to enhance its anaerobic biodegradability, the present research investigated the effect of thermal pretreatment at two temperatures (70 and 90 °C) applied to Scenedesmus biomass. No differences were detected in terms of organic matter or ammonium release upon the two tested temperatures. Nevertheless, a different fact was observed for their anaerobic biodegradability. While raw and pretreated at 70 °C microalgae attained 22–24% anaerobic biodegradability, microalgae pretreated at 90 °C achieved anaerobic biodegradability of 48%. Even though similar profiles were obtained for both temperatures along the pretreatment period, the damage caused in the cell wall at 90 °C seemed to be greater and rendered this substrate readily degradable for anaerobic digestion.