Biogas Production - Pretreatment Methods in Anaerobic Digestion (Wiley-Scrivener, 2012).pdf

Biogas Production covers the most cutting-edge pretreatment processes being used and studied today for the production of biogas.

As an increasingly important piece of the "energy pie," biogas and other biofuels are being used more and more around the world in every conceivable area of industry and could be a partial answer to the energy problem and the elimination of global warming.

This book will highlight the recent advances in the pretreatment and value addition of lignocellulosic wastes (LCW) with the main focus on domestic and agro-industrial residues. Mechanical, physical, and biological treatment systems are brought into perspective. The main value-added products from lignocellulosic wastes are summarized in a manner that pinpoints the most recent trends and the future directions.

Physico-chemical and biological treatment systems seem to be the most favored options while biofuels, biodegradable composites, and biosorbents production paint a bright picture of the current and future bio-based products. Engineered microbes seem to tackle the problem of bioconversion of substrates that are otherwise nonconvertible by conventional wild strains. Although the main challenge facing LCW utilization is the high costs involved in treatment and production processes, some recent affordable processes with promising results have been proposed. Future trends are being directed to nanobiotechnology and genetic engineering for improved processes and products.

This groundbreaking new volume:

Is a comprehensive compilation of anaerobic digestion methods, the treatment processes used for organic wastes and process residues

Covers hydrolysis, the rate-limiting step of anaerobic digestion of semi-solid wastes, in which both solubilization of particulate matter and biological decomposition of organic polymers to monomers or dimers take place

Offers an in-depth study of potential unconventional feedstocks for anaerobic digestion technology and their practical applications

Is in line with the growing green chemistry and green engineering practices, covering research and development of unconventional pretreatment techniques to improve the kinetics of hydrolysis and hence enhance the biogas production rates and yields from lignocellulosic biomass during anaerobic digestion processes.