Biogas production by psychrophilic anaerobic digestion and biogas-to-hydrogen through methane reforming: experimental study and process simulation

Hajizadeh, Abdollah (2021) Biogas production by psychrophilic anaerobic digestion and biogas-to-hydrogen through methane reforming: experimental study and process simulation. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

[img] [English] PDF - Accepted Version
Available under License - The author retains copyright ownership and moral rights in this thesis. Neither the thesis nor substantial extracts from it may be printed or otherwise reproduced without the author's permission.

Download (4MB)

Abstract

This research investigated the early stage of the culture’s adaptation during psychrophilic anaerobic digestion (20゚C) of complex substrates (dairy manure and grass silage) at increasing organic loading rate (OLR; 1-5 g VS/L.d) and total solids content (TS; 7-10%) in batch reactors. The methane yield from mono-digestion of dairy manure was higher at lower OLRs, while in co-digestion of the dairy manure and grass silage, the trend was the opposite. Similarly, the reactors with lower TS content showed higher methane yield in mono-digestion of dairy manure. Introducing grass silage to the bioreactors enhanced the methane yield in all experiments. The substrate degradation by inoculum was confirmed by three kinetic models (first-order, Cone, and modified-Gompertz). The microbiome analysis revealed that the Bacteroidetes phylum was dominant, indicating the inoculum’s capability to degrade and ferment the organic matter in the complex substrates. An integrated psychrophilic anaerobic digestion with a dry methane reforming plant for green hydrogen production was rigorously simulated using Aspen Plus V11. The results indicated that 48.07 kg/h biogas could produce 8.11 kg/h hydrogen. In addition, the proposed process reduced the CO₂ emission by 398,736 tonnes/year compared to the direct use of biogas for electricity production. The current research provides an assessment of the on-farm biogas plants potential in cold environments. In addition, the developed process simulation platform could be employed to design and optimize the biogas plants.

Item Type: Thesis (Masters)
URI: http://research.library.mun.ca/id/eprint/15085
Item ID: 15085
Additional Information: Includes bibliographical references.
Keywords: Anaerobic digestion, Psychrophilic, Biogas, Kinetic modeling, Microbiome analysis, Hydrogen, Dry methane reforming, CO2 emissions
Department(s): Engineering and Applied Science, Faculty of
Date: October 2021
Date Type: Submission
Digital Object Identifier (DOI): https://doi.org/10.48336/7s34-6q14
Library of Congress Subject Heading: Biogas--Analysis; Biogas--Properties; Hydrogen; Methane.

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over the past year

View more statistics