The Use of Bioremediation Products in Ananerobic Co-Digestion of Fat, Oil, and Grease (FOG) and Municipal Waste
Open Access
Author:
Folk, Sarah
Area of Honors:
Civil Engineering
Degree:
Bachelor of Science
Document Type:
Thesis
Thesis Supervisors:
Yen-Chih Chen, Thesis Supervisor Sai Kakuturu, Thesis Honors Advisor Yuefeng F. Xie, Faculty Reader
Keywords:
Anaerobic Digestion Co-Digestion FOG BioAmp Wastewater Treatment Sludge Cumulative Methane Yield Fat Oil and Grease Bioremediation
Abstract:
The focus of this study was to determine the impacts of the digestion of fat, oil, and grease waste (FOG) with the municipal waste. Additionally, a bioremediation product, BioAmp, was used to determine its impact on the stability of the reactors and on biogas yields. The variation of mixed versus settled FOG samples was also investigated for its impact on biogas yields. Ten different reactor compositions were created: sewage sludge, inoculum, before and after BioAmp Treatment with mixed FOG, before and after BioAmp treatment with settled FOG, and co-digestion with these four variations of FOG and sewage sludge. Tests were taken before and after the experiment to determine the characteristics of the samples and stability of the reactors. The reactors were maintained at 35 °C for 91 days. Biogas readings were taken daily from each reactor. From these tests we determined that the stability of the reactors was not impacted by fat, oil, and grease. Co-digestion of sewage sludge with FOG proved to have a favorable impact on biogas yields. Actual yields for co-digestion were up to 20% higher than predicted gas production using mono-digestion rates. BioAmp facilitated higher biogas yields. A 42% increase was observed between for the mixed mono-digestion fat, oil, and grease samples after BioAmp treatment. Additionally, the mixed FOG samples provided higher biogas yields than the settled FOG samples. Overall, co-digestion of FOG proved to be feasible and beneficial.