Pretreatment of waste-activated sludge for enhancement of methane production

Abstract

Although different disposal routes of waste-activated sludge are possible, anaerobic digestion plays an important role tor its abilities to further transform organic matter into methane, The potential of using methane as energy source has long been widely recognised and the present paper extensively reviews the principles of anaerobic digestion, the process parameters and hydrolysis. Hydrolysis is recognised as rate-limiting step in the complex digestion process. To accelerate the digestion and enhance the production of biogas, various pre-treatments can be used to improve the rate-limiting hydrolysis. These treatments include mechanical, thermal, chemical and biological interventions to the feedstock. All pre-treatments result in a lysis or disintegration of sludge cells, thus releasing and solubilizing intracellular material into the water phase and transforming refractory organic material into biodegradable species. The reader will finally be guided to extensive discussion for anaerobic digestion processes.