Bioresource Technology 96 (2005) 15371543

Improving acidogenic performance in anaerobic degradation of solid organic waste using a rotational drum fermentation system
Wei Zhong Jiang
a

a,*

, Yutaka Kitamura b, Baoming Li

College of Water Conservancy & Civil Engineering, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100083, China b Institute of Agricultural and Forest Engineering, University of Tsukuba, 305-8572, Japan Received 20 September 2004; received in revised form 22 December 2004; accepted 26 December 2004 Available online 5 February 2005

Abstract The eects of leachate from a methanogenic process on acidogenic performance of a solid recycle (SR) process by a rotational drum fermentation (RDF) system were evaluated under mesophilic condition and a hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 20 days. Two SR process congurations, SR1 and SR2, were evaluated, using fresh soybean meal or Okara as substrates. An apparent rst-order hydrolysis rate constant of 5.0 103/d for SR1 at pH values of 4.4 and 14.4 103/d for SR2 at pH of 5.0, were obtained. The apparent volatile solids (VS) degradation ratio ranged from 9.6% to 19.4% and total volatile acid (as acetic acid) from 10.8 to 14.9 g/L. Occupying ratios for ionized volatile acid (VA) increased from 30.6% to 63.4% after recycling the leachate to process. However, occupying ratios of acetic acid decreased from 93.3% to 42.0% whereas propionic acid and butyric acid ratios increased in SR2. Integrating the VA production with the hydrolysis rate constants, it is clear that the recirculation of leachate considerably enhanced acidogenic performance of solid recycle process. 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Leachate of methanogenic process; Solid recycle process; Hydrolysis rate constant; Volatile solid degradation ratio; Unionized VA; Ionized VA; VA spectrum

1. Introduction In comparison with conventional one-phase process, two-phase process of anaerobic digestion for organic waste treatment involves Phase Iacidogenic process, and Phase IImethanogenic process. The two-phase process has following advantages: (1) maintaining optimal environmental conditions for each group of microorganisms and concomitantly accelerating the conversion of substrate, (2) increasing stability in treatment by balancing the acidogenesis (acidication/liquefaction phase) and methanogenesis (gasication phase), and (3) disposing sludge with relatively fast growing
Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 10 62736904; fax: +86 10 62736413. E-mail address: jiangwz@cau.edu.cn (W.Z. Jiang). 0960-8524/$ - see front matter 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2004.12.019
*

acid-forming and retaining methane producing microorganisms (Cohen et al., 1979). In recent years, a twophase anaerobic digestion of solid wastes was used to treat municipal solid wastes (Sans et al., 1995; Chugh et al., 1999), solid food waste (Argelier et al., 1998), vegetable substrates (Raynal et al., 1998; Traverso et al., 2000), and mixture of activated sludge and fruit/vegetable waste (Dinsdale et al., 2000). Because methanogenic microorganisms cannot directly degrade waste particles, it becomes crucial that metabolic intermediary products of biodegradation in Phase I involve the process in hydrolysis and fermentation (Eastman and Ferguson, 1981). However, according to the degradation model proposed by Veeken et al. (2000), the accumulation of metabolic intermediary products such as volatile acid may cause not only obstacle of methanogenesis but also hydrolysis and acidogenesis. The separation of these two

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phases may increase this possibility. When unionized volatile acid (UVA) was greater than 60 mg/L, it inhibited methanogenesis (Kroeker et al., 1979). Further, Garca et al. (1991) found that UVA inhibited acidogenesis. It was suspected that hydrolysis rate of solid organic particles was also aected by UVA (Llabres-Luengo and Mata-Alvarez, 1988). In addition, physical separation of overall anaerobic process into two phases may result in excessive hydrogen-forming in the case of the lack of methanogenic microorganisms, which suppress the syntrophic acidogenic reactions (Fox and Pohland, 1994). To balance each phase using recycled euent from methanogenic process to acidogenic or hydrolysis process, numerous studies were conducted. Rijkens et al. (1984) founded a phase-separation process for agricultural solid organic wastes. In their work, the solid organic materials were degraded in Phase I by acidogenic microorganisms, which was fed by percolation of recycled process water (from methanogenic process). This phase was followed by a methanogenic process. A two-phase process was simulated for solid organic wastes based on the approach mentioned above (Mata-Alvarez, 1987). Chynoweth et al. (1992) used a leach-bed process to enhance the degradation of sorted municipal solid wastes (MSW) at thermophilic conditions. A similar process was proposed to treat unsorted MSW and obtain a solid degradation ratio of 75% in about 2 months (Chugh et al., 1999). Veeken et al. (2000) designed an experimental device of batch-wise solid-state digestion (BSSD) to evaluate the eect of substrate-seed mixing and leachate recirculation on solid-state digestion of biowaste. They observed that the apparent rst-order hydrolysis rate (AFOHR) constant increased from 0.001 to 0.017 d1 when the leachate recirculation rate increased from 1 to 100 m3/m3/d. Therefore, the recyclement of leachate which obtained from methanogenic process accelerated both hydrolysis of solid waste and production of methane (Wujcik and Jewell, 1980). In order to accelerate degradation of solid organic waste, Jiang et al. (2002) developed a rotational drum fermentation (RDF) system. The authors used fresh soybean meal (Okara) as the substrates and obtained a total volatile acid (TVA) as the acetic acid of 17 g/L and a rst-order hydrolysis rate constant of 0.0037 d1 at mesophilic condition and the hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 20 days. To obtain higher TVA concentration and hydrolysis rate, Jiang et al. (2003) introduced a conguration of cascade and solid recycle process of acidogenesis. Their results showed that the separation of hydrolysis and acidogenesis aected strongly the acidogenic performance in terms of volatile acid (VA) constituents and distribution of the ionized and unionized VA. However, the rst-order hydrolysis rate (FOHR) constants and volatile solid (VS) degradation ratios were

low comparing with the results obtained by Kitamura et al. (1998). The purpose of this study was to improve acidogenic performance and increase the hydrolysis rate constant. The objectives of this study were to: (1) develop a solid recycle (SR) process of rotational drum fermentation (RDF) system that recycles the leachate from a methanogenic to acidogenic processes, and (2) evaluate the effects of leachate on acidogenic performance. The RDF system developed in authors previous work (Jiang et al., 2002) was used to compare the acidogenic performance between two SR processes. The AFOHR constants and VS degradation ratios of the two SR processes were presented.

2. Methods 2.1. Feedstock and seeding sludge Fresh soybean meal or Okara was used as substrates, which is a food process by-product from soybean curd (Hisaki Tofu, Shimane, Japan). It contains approximately 20% total solids. The chemical characteristics of the soybean meal were identical to the ones used previously by Kitamura et al. (1998). The mesophilic anaerobic sludge from a municipal sewage treatment center (Shimane, Japan) was inoculated to the fermentors as the seeding sludge. Prior to the experiments, a preheated mixture of the fresh anaerobic sludge and the fermented sludge was inoculated into each fermentor at a weight ratio of 1:1 (anaerobic sludge:fermented sludge). The substrate was fed daily by the draw-and-ll method at an HRT of 20 days for each process. 2.2. SR process congurations The SR processes were congured as shown in Fig. 1. Each process consisted of two fermentors for pseudohydrolysis and pseudoacidogenesis, respectively. SR process 1 consisted of fermentor I and II. Feedstock and the euent from fermentor II were fed to fermentor I. Then, the euent from fermentor I was separated into solid and liquid. The solid portion was fed to fermentor II. The liquid portion was excreted as an euent of SR process 1. SR process 2 comprised fermentor III and IV. The feedstock and the euent from fermentor IV were fed to fermentor III. The readily biodegradable organic solid was catabolized rst in fermentor III. The refractory portion and remaining products from fermentor III were diluted by leachate from a methanogenic process. The later two portions were fed to fermentor IV for further hydrolysis and acidication (Fig. 1). In this

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Recirculation of leachate (rL) Biogas

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a S0 as VS a I (III) S2, K2, R2 II (IV)

Inorganic wastewater

HRT: 5 d (5 d)

Solid recycle: S1 (rS)

HRT: 10 d (15 d) Methanogenic fermentor

S, K0, R0

Fig. 1. Solid recycle process congurations. a (g/d): feeding rate of Okara; a (): recirculation ratio of leachate to feeding rate for fermentor II and IV, respectively; S (g/L): VS concentration in each stream; rL (): recirculation ratio of leachate to volume of corresponding fermentor content for solid recycle process; rs (): recirculation ratio (weight) of the euent of fermentor I (III) to II (IV) to the inuent of the solid recycle process (Okara).

gure, a represent the recirculation ratio of leachate to feeding rate for fermentor II and IV. In the case of a = 0, the process was named as solid recycle process 1, SR process 1. When a = 1, the process was called solid recycle process 2, SR process 2 which included a methanogenic process. This methanogenic process was founded prior to the startup of acidogenic experiments. Inorganic wastewater (Chang et al., 1982) was fed to this process daily. This operation was held at mesophilic condition and an HRT of 10 days. The liquid portion of the euent was obtained at centrifugation at 3000 rpm for 3 min. It was recycled to acidogenic processes as a leachate of methanogenic process. The content of total solid (TS) in the leachate was near zero. CH4 contents in the biogas produced in the previous process and the VA concentration in the euent of the methanogenic process were 6472% in volume and 1900 mg/L, respectively. According to Lai et al. (2001), the soluble COD generation in the 5% bed-volume experiment (5% bed-volume leachate was exchanged daily between a NEW and OLD bed) was similar to that in 10% bed-volume experiment after the same duration of digestion. In this work, a 5% working volume of fermentor IV leachate was added to SR process 2. Table 1 summarized the setup of these parameters. 2.3. Experimental apparatus and setups A rotational system consisting fermentors developed by the authors in previous work (Jiang et al., 2002) was
Table 1 Experimental conditions Fermentor no. I II III IV Methane fermentor HRT (days) 5 10 5 15 10 Feeding rate (/d)

used. The pseudohydrolysis fermentors (II and IV) were lled with aluminum oxide milling balls (diameter = 30 mm) that took 10% of 3.6 L volume. To prevent the ball from rotating to create an adverse eect on biomass growth, there were no balls in the pseudoacidogenic fermentor I and III. This rotational system and the methanogenic process were operated at an incubator under a constant mesophilic temperature (3638 C). The solid and liquid separation of euent from fermentor I and III was carried out using a juice presser (Pearl Metal Co. Ltd., HBJCT) with 25-meshes stainless sieve (SUS316). A 102.4 kPa force was applied. The separation was terminated after 31 days because of the inability to separate the liquid portion from the euent in SR process 1. Rotation was conducted at 30-min intervals for 15 min throughout the experimental period. The speed of the drum rotation was 12 rpm. 2.4. Measurement and analysis The values of pH, total solids, volatile acids, and volatile solids were determined according to the sewage test procedure (Japan Sewage Association, 1997). A capillary electrophoresis analytical system (HP, 3DCE) was used to monitor the distribution of VA spectrum in the steady state. Biogas composition analysis was performed for CH4 and CO2 content using a gas chromatograph (SHIMADZU, GC-14A) equipped with a thermal conductivity detector (TCD).

Loading rate (/L/d) 100 g Okara + 100 g sludge from II 100 g sludge from I 88.9 g Okara + 111.1 g sludge from IV 13.3 g sludge from III + 53.3 g leachate from methane fermentor 100 g inorganic wastewater + 1 g acetic acid

120 g Okara + 120 g sludge from II 120 g sludge from I 120 g Okara + 150 g sludge from IV 30 g sludge (solid fraction) from III + 120 g leachate from methane fermentor 300 g inorganic wastewater + 3 g acetic acid

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3. Results and discussion 3.1. Volatile acid production The values of pH, pH gradient, TVA, TVA gradient, ionized and unionized VA distribution, and VA spectrum for all fermentors are shown in Table 2. These values are the average of a consecutive one-month data under the steady-state condition. When the pH level was between 4.4 and 5.4, the acidogenesis was prevailing in all fermentors. In comparison with the result of fermentors I and II, the pH values in fermentor III and IV had a maximum increase of 1.0 due to the addition of leachate. A high VA concentration (10.414.9 g/L) was observed in each fermentor. The highest VA concentration (14.9 g/L) occurred in fermentor III followed by fermentors IV (13.4 g/L) and I (10.8 g/L). The lowest VA concentration existed in fermentor II (10.4 g/L). The VA concentration of SR process 2 was higher than that of SR process 1 because more VA was found in fermentor IV where the leachate was added. As shown in Tables 2 and 3, SR process 2 was more favorable to the establishment of the reactants (substrates and products) concentration and pH gradients after the addition of leachate. The pH values decreased from 5.6 to 5.0 in fermentor III, and from 6.6 to 5.4 in fermentor IV. Simultaneously, VS content decreased from 108.0 to 96.3 g/L in fermentor III and from 52.1 to 44.0 g/L in fermentor IV. As a result, the VA concentration increased in Solid recycle process 2, from 7.4 to 14.9 g/L in fermentor III, and from 3.0 (averaging the VA concentration of fermentor III and the leachate) to 13.4 g/L in fermentor IV. It was known that the absence of leachate was unfavorable for the establishment of reactants concentration and the pH gradient in fermentor II. In the present work, the pH level decreased from 5.5 to 4.4 in fermentor I whereas no pH gradient and products gradient (VA, 3.2 g/L) were founded in fermentor II without the addition of leachate. The VS content decreased from 178.4 to 170.0 g/L in fermentor I and from 170.0 to 168.7 g/L in fermentor II, respectively. The TVA concentration increased from 5.2 to 10.8 g/L in fermentor I, whereas, no visible increase in the VA concentration in fermentor II was found due to the inhibition of low pH level and high VA. From the viewpoint of VA generation, SR process was aected substantially by the recirculation of leachate. Fermentor I (10.8 g/L) contributed all the VA to SR process 1 whereas fermentor II did not. A higher VA contribution ratio of fermentor I was because a high gradients of pH level (4.45.5) and substrates. Low contribution ratio to SR process 1 and increment of VA concentration in fermentor II was due to absence of pH gradient and inhibition from high VA concentration of inuent.
6.7 0.0 5.7 0.0 ND ND 5.5 0.0 4.4 0.0 5.6 0.1 6.6 0.1 6.5 0.1 Feedstock SR1 SR2 I II III IV Okara 4.4 0.1 4.4 0.1 5.0 0.1 5.4 0.1 Note: ND represents not detectable. 1.1 0 0.6 1.2 In Out Table 2 Steady-state parameters for all fermentors Acidogenic process Fermentor no. pH () 5.2 0.2 10.8 0.8 7.4 0.3 3.0 0.2 10.8 0.8 10.4 1.1 14.9 1.0 13.4 0.8 5.6 0.4 7.5 10.4 In Out pH gradient TVA (g/L) 30.6 1.1 30.8 0.7 63.4 1.7 81.3 1.3 69.4 2.4 69.2 2.1 36.6 1.4 18.7 0.3 93.3 2.3 82.9 1.8 42.0 0.8 56.5 1.3 ND 11.4 0.2 32.8 0.4 21.8 0.3 ND ND 25.2 0.3 21.6 0.2 Succinic acid (%) VA spectrum VA distribution TVA gradient (g/L) Ionized VA (%) Unionized VA (%) Acetic acid (%) Propionic acid (%) Butyric acid (%)

W.Z. Jiang et al. / Bioresource Technology 96 (2005) 15371543 Table 3 Steady-state parameters for all fermentors Acidogenic process Fermentor no. VS (g/L) In SR1 SR2 Feedstock I II III IV Okara 178.4 4.9 170.0 4.4 108.0 3.1 52.1 1.5 188.0 5.8 Out 170.0 4.4 168.7 4.2 96.3 2.3 44.0 1.3 8.4 1.3 11.7 8.1 VS gradient (g/L) Hydrolysis rate constant (Kh, 103/d) 9.6 0.8 22.9 11.3

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VS degradation ratio (R, %) 4.7 0.8 10.8 15.6

Fermentor III (7.5 g/L) provided 50.3% of all the VA to SR process 2. The remaining 49.7% was provided by the fermentor IV. The recirculation of leachate was believed to cause a higher contribution ratio and increment of VA concentration (13.4 g/L) in fermentor IV than that of the fermentor II. It helped to establish the pH gradient approaching to optimum one (6.06.5) proposed by Kisaalita and Pinder (1987) and raise the level of moisture. It also upgraded the rheological property of the substrate in the fermentor IV. In turn, the addition of leachate promoted the pulverization and hydrolysis of solid particles. Comparing the VA concentration increment in fermentor IV with that in fermentor II, the addition of leachate assisted not only the establishment of the pH gradient but also the elevation of the moisture level. The pH gradient in the fermentor IV (from 6.6 to 5.4) was slightly higher than that in the fermentor II (no pH gradient). On the other hand, the phenomenon of increment of VA concentration in fermentor IV was higher that in the fermentor II because of the lower VA concentration of feedstock from fermentor III (3.0 g/L). The low level of VA concentration was diluted by leachate. This phenomenon implied the adverse effects of products on the acidogenic performance. It is known that the volatile acid exists in solution as two principal forms: unionized (UVA) and ionized VA. The concentrations of UVA are determined by the following equilibrium expression: UVA VA10pK a pH =1 10pK a pH 1

where pKa is the dissociation constant value of the acids in water, Ka = 4.762 for acetic acid at 35 C (Weast, 1981). The distributions of ionized and unionized VA are given in Table 2. It was found that the occupying ratio of ionized VA increased as pH increases. The highest ratio of ionized VA to total VA was observed in fermentor IV (81.3% TVA), followed by fermentor III (63.4% TVA). The lowest ratio occurred in fermentor I and II (30.6 30.8% TVA). Integrating the distribution of the ionized and unionized VA in SR process 2 with that of SR process 1, it was found that the distribution was aected strongly by the addition of leachate. The occupying ratio of ionized VA in the euent increased from 30.6% in SR process 1 to

63.4% in SR process 2. The occupying ratios of ionized VA in SR process 2 were elevated by manipulating the pH levels under the addition of leachate. The VA spectrum is also shown in Table 2. The VA spectrum varied with the fermentors. Acetic acid (ca. 93.3% total VA for fermentor I and 82.9% total VA for fermentor II) was predominant in fermentor I and II, followed by propionic acid (ca. 11.4% total VA for fermentor I) and succinic acid (ca. 6.7% total VA for fermentor I and 5.7% total VA for II). Due to the addition of leachate, succinic acid was not detectable whereas propionic acid was observed in fermentor III and IV (ca. 32.8% and 21.8% total VA, respectively). Higher butyric acid, 25.2% and 21.6% total VA, also existed in fermentors III and IV, respectively. The rest volatile acids were measured at negligible concentrations. In contrast to SR process 1, the eect of leachate on SR process 2 was revealed by a shift in the VA spectra, in which the occupying ratio of acetic acid was decreased from 93.3% to 42.0%. The existence of propionic and butyric acids suggested that the addition of leachate accelerated the degradation of long-chain VA such as succinic acid. A greater propionic acid content was observed in SR process 2 that would be fatal for methanogenic process. The decreased occupying ratio of acetic acid in fermentor III and IV (42.0% and 56.5%) demonstrated that the higher ionized VA was prone to be converted to biogas by methanogenic microorganisms. In addition, the absence of amino acids from protein hydrolysis in each fermentor may explain the presence of carbohydrates, which suppressed the protein degradation (Yu and Fang Herbert, 2001). 3.2. Hydrolysis rate constant The VS, VS gradient, VS degradation ratios, and hydrolysis rate constants of all fermentors are given in Table 3. Based on the rst-order hydrolysis kinetics, the hydrolysis phase can be expressed using the following equation. dS K h S dt 2

where Kh is the particulate matter hydrolysis rate constant (per day), h = 1, 2, 3, and 4 for each fermentor, and S is the substrate concentration in solid phase (g-VS/L).

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Alternatively, Eq. (2) can be transformed into Eq. (3) by a denite integral   S0 K hT ln 3 ST where S0 is the initial substrate concentration (g-VS/L) at T = 0; ST is the substrate concentration in fermentor withdrawal at time T (g-VS/L); and T the reaction time or HRT (days). Under the steady state, the microorganism is in the exponential growth period. Therefore, the reaction time is equivalent to the HRT. Substituting the experimental data of each fermentor, Kh for each fermentor was calculated (Table 3). A largest Kh of 22.9 103/d for fermentor III was obtained. The highest Kh in fermentor III was because of the readily biodegradable solid content supplied by pulverization of milling ball in fermentor IV and fresh feedstock. The second highest value occurred in fermentor IV, K4 = 11.3 103/d. It followed by fermentor I (K1 = 9.6 103/d) whereas the lowest value of Kh (0.8 103/d) occurred in fermentor II. The lowest values in fermentor II was due to the adverse eect of high products concentration on hydrolysis and the absence of the pH gradient. The recirculation of leachate in SR process 2 elevated the Kh of fermentor IV (K4 = 11.3 103/d) in contrast to fermentor II of SR process 1 (K2 = 0.8 103/d). Recycling the euent of fermentor IV to fermentor III facilitated the establishment of higher pH gradient than that of fermentor I, and elevating the hydrolysis rate constant in SR process 2 (from 9.6 103 to 22.9 103/d). Although fermentor III had a relative low pH gradient, its hydrolysis rate constant (K3 = 22.9 103/d) was higher than that of fermentor IV. This was because the former contained the more readily biodegradable organic solid while the later was fed with the mixture of leachate and refractory fraction from fermentor III. The rate of hydrolysis increased with biodegradability was expected and consistent with Tong et al. (1990). It was suggested that the increase of biodegradability of solid particles was optimizing the occupying ratio of milling ball and the pathway of leachate recirculation. It could be approached by manipulating the conguration of processes and fermentors. The apparent hydrolysis rate constant (K0, /d) for SR process 1 was    1 S0 S0 K0 ln 1 rs 1 eK 2 T 2 eK 1 T 1 rs 1 4 T0 S0 S0 where T0, T1 and T2 are the apparent HRT for SR process 1 and HRTs for fermentor I and II (days), respectively; K1 and K2 are the FOHR constants for fermentor I and II (/d); S0, S 01 are the solid content of feedstock (Okara) and the recycling portion from the euent of fermentor I to II (g-VS/L); and rs is the ratio

of the recycling fraction weight from the euent of fermentor I to II to the inuent weight of the SR process (Okara). T0 can be obtained through T0 T 1 1 a rs T 2 a rs 1a 5

where T0, T1, T2 and rs are as dened previously; and a is the recirculation ratio of leachate to feeding rate for fermentor II (Fig. 1). When the case of a = 0, the experimental conditions are identical to SR process 1 as shown in Fig. 1. When a = 1, the experimental conditions are in respect to SR process 2, where K0 is determined as:    1 S0 S0 K 00 0 ln 1 rs 3 eK 4 T 4 eK 3 T 3 rs 3 6 T0 S0 S0 In this equation, T 00 , T3 and T4 are the apparent HRT for SR process 2, and the HRTs for fermentor III and IV (days), respectively; K3 and K4 are the FOHR constants for fermentor III and IV (/d); S0, S 03 are the solid content of feedstock (Okara) and the recycling portion from the euent of fermentor III to IV (g-VS/L); and rs the ratio of the recycling portion weight from the euent of fermentor III to IV to the inuent weight of the SR process (Okara). According to the experimental conditions, K0 of 5.0 103/d and K 00 of 14.4 103/d for SR process1 and SR process 2 were obtained. These results indicated that the addition of leachate aected strongly on the performance of SR process. A signicant low value of K0 was due to the excessive K2 suppressed by a high VA concentration of inuent. 3.3. Volatile solid degradation ratio The VS degradation ratio (R, %) was R S in S out 100 S in 7

where R is the VS degradation ratio (%); Sin is the initial substrate concentration (g-VS/L); and Sout the substrate concentration of withdrawal from fermentors (g-VS/L). Substituting the measured quantity of solid content of each fermentor to the above equation, R of each fermentor can be calculated and shown in Table 3. The highest VS degradation ratio (R4 = 15.6%) was observed in fermentor IV. It was followed by R3 = 11.7% in fermentor III. This was due to be the presence of higher pH gradient with the addition of leachate and milling balls. Although addition of milling balls was added in the fermentor II, the R-value remained a low level due to the absence of pH gradient. The lowest VS degradation ratio (R2 = 0.8%) occurred in fermentor II where inhibition resulted from the high

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VA concentration of inuent (10.8 g/L) with excessive low pH level as shown in Table 2. The R-value of fermentor III (R3 = 10.8%) doubled that of fermentor I (R1 = 4.7%). The former was because the addition of leachate. The apparent VS degradation ratios of the SR process 1 and for SR process 2 can be concluded by the following two equations: R0 1 1 R1 1 rs R1 R2 R1 R2 8

where R0, R1 and R2 are the apparent VS degradation ratio for SR process 1, fermentor I and II (%), respectively; rs is the ratio of the recycling portion weight from the euent of fermentor I to II to the inuent weight of SR process (Okara). R00 R3 R3 R4 R3 R4 rs S 03 S0 9

where R00 , R3 and R4 are the apparent VS degradation ratio for SR process 2, fermentor III and IV (%), respectively; S0, S 03 and rs are as dened previously. Substituting the values of R1, R2, R3 and R4 to Eqs. (8) and (9), R0 values for SR process 1 and SR process 2 can be obtained as 9.6% and 19.4%, respectively. Based on the results of hydrolysis rate constant and VS degradation ratio, it was obvious that the recirculation of leachate promoted considerably the hydrolysis in the solid recycle process. In summary, it is clear that the recirculation of leachate can improve acidogenic performance of solid recycle process such as increasing VA concentration and VS degradation ratio. Moreover, recirculation of leachate also enhanced the pH levels in overall process due to its neutralization, and, in turn, redistributed the ionized and unionized VA.

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