| Grant number: | 10/04101-8 |
| Support type: | Scholarships in Brazil - Master |
| Effective date (Start): | March 01, 2011 |
| Effective date (End): | February 28, 2013 |
| Field of knowledge: | Engineering - Sanitary Engineering - Water Supply and Wastewater Treatment |
| Principal Investigator: | Marcelo Loureiro Garcia |
| Grantee: | Lucas Tadeu Fuess |
| Home Institution: | Instituto de Geociências e Ciências Exatas (IGCE). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Rio Claro. Rio Claro , SP, Brazil |
| Associated research grant: | 09/15984-0 - Bioenergy production from wastewaters and environmental fitting of liquid and solid wastes generated, AP.TEM |
Abstract The objective of this work is to verify whether anaerobic reactors applied to the treatment of residues with high concentrations of organic matter (e.g. stillage and brewery wastewater) are energetically favorable. Anaerobic digestion is characterized as an efficient process to treat effluents, such that it significantly reduces the environmental impact associated to the pollutant loading of the effluents. In addition, the methane gas produced in this process may be used to generate energy, which can directly supply the treatment plant, reducing the use of nonrenewable resources and even providing a self-sustaining system. Anaerobic digestion is composed of four main phases, hydrolysis, acidogenesis, acetogenesis and methanogenesis, through which five different groups of microorganisms at least are involved. The residues with high concentrations of organic matter that will be conceptually assessed in this work include stillage, those from breeding (pigs and cattle) and breweries, while the stillage will also be experimentally evaluated in terms of its methanogenic potential. The stillages will be sampled in three different sugar cane-to-ethanol production plants located in the Rio Claro (SP) city area. The next step will be based on the energy balance analysis of the plant whose stillage has the highest potencial to be tranformed into methane, considering both the actual plant operating conditions and the hypothesis of applying an anaerobic reactor to treat the stillage. | |