Evaluation of Biogas from Sugarcane Trash through Anaerobic Digestion Process

Abstract

The constant generation of agricultural wastes and its inappropriate newlinemanagement has been contributing a very important role in the current perspective of newlineenvironmental pollution. Agricultural Wastes (AW) generation levels in India is about newline1.3 billion tonnes per year and are projected to raise to an approximate 2 billion tons newlineper year by 2030. These organic wastes which are disposed by open burning in the newlineagricultural land field leads to the production of greenhouse gases and further leads to newlineglobal warming. Sugarcane cultivation generates a huge amount residues overall and newlineare all subjected to open burning after the harvest of sugarcane which in turn affects the newlineenvironment causing air pollution. This problem could get overcome by practicing the newlineanaerobic digestion technology which is regarded as the most phenomenal approach in newlinethe waste management sector as it benefits the society by converting the organic wastes newlineinto bio fuel and organic rich manure. Further, the lignocellulose components of the newlinesugarcane trash cannot ensure self-digestion easily and its digestion could be possible newlinewith the use of microbes present in the livestock manures. In order to justify the newlineanaerobic digestion of sugarcane trash with the inoculation of livestock manures, the newlinelab scale experiments were conducted with five different cases to identify the maximum newlinebiogas generation and greater lignocellulosic degradation. These experiments were newlineperformed in a two litre lab scale anaerobic reactor with provisions for stirring and newlinetemperature maintenance of the feed. The hydraulic retention time was maintained as newline30 days. During the anaerobic digestion process, the biogas production was monitored newlineand few parameters like pH, alkalinity, nutrient concentrations and rate of newlinelignocellulosic degradation were monitored. The study was intended to conduct newlineexperiments with five different cases namely, Case A: Study on the influence of newlinedifferent inoculum sources on anaerobic digestion of sugarcane trash. The inoculums newlinenamely the dairy manure (DM),