The Influence of CO[sub.2] Injection into Manure as a Pretreatment Method for Increased Biogas Production

Manure is considered a by-product or organic waste in cattle, pig, chicken or other animal breeding farms, which can be a valuable product as compost or feedstock for biogas production. The production of biomethane from biogas always copes with the formation of carbon dioxide (CO[sub.2] ) as a by-product. This CO[sub.2] may be recycled through the feedstock as a pretreatment to maximize homogeneity, and improve biogas yield and biogas quality. The CO[sub.2] -pretreatment process of cow manure (CoM), chicken manure (ChM) and pig manure (PM) was performed in the continuously fed agitated reactor at 25 °C temperature and ambient barometric pressure. Biogas yield and composition exploration were performed in an anaerobic continuous feeding digester with controlled mesophilic (37 °C) environmental conditions. The CO[sub.2] pretreated PM, CoM and ChM yielded 234.62 ± 10.93 L/kg[sub.VS] , 82.01 ± 3.19 L/kg[sub.VS] and 374.53 ± 9.27 L/kg[sub.VS] biomethane from feedstock volatile solids, respectively. The biomethane yield from CO[sub.2] pretreated CoM, ChM and PM achieved was higher over untreated manure by +33.78%, +28.76% and +21.78%, respectively. The anaerobic digestion process of tested feedstocks was stable, and the pH of the substrate was kept steady at a pH of CoM 7.77 ± 0.02, PM 8.07 ± 0.02 and ChM 8.09 ± 0.02 during all the experiment. The oxidation-reduction potential after pretreatment was within the optimal range (−255 ± 39.0 to −391 ± 16.8 mV) for anaerobic digestion. This process also had a positive effect on the energy generated from the feedstock, with ChM showing the greatest increase, from 2.38 MJ/kg to 3.06 MJ/kg.