Year: 2021
Type: article
Study designs: Systematic Review, Meta-Analysis
Abstract: Climate change and energy demand are calling more sustainable fuels such as biomethane produced by anaerobic digestion of organic waste. Biochar addition to waste is presumed to enhance the efficiency of methane production, yet individual reports disclose contradictory results. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis of 27 selected publications containing 156 paired measurements of control and biochar-amended treatments to assess the impact of biochar on methanogenic performance. Results show that biochar promotes biomethane production substantially with a high Hedge's d value of 5.7 ± 1.04, yet sporadic publications report a methane decline. Methanogenic performance is statistically controlled by feedstock type, pyrolysis temperature and biochar concentration, but not controlled by pH, size, surface area and methanogen species. Our findings should help to tune the parameters of anaerobic digestion with biochar to optimize biomethane productions.
Source: Environmental Chemistry Letters
Authors: Leilei Xiao, Eric Lichtfouse, P. Senthil Kumar, Quan Wang, Fanghua Liu
Institutions: Chinese Academy of Sciences, Yantai Institute of Coastal Zone Research, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Aix-Marseille Université, Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement, Centre de Recherche et d’Enseignement de Géosciences de l’Environnement, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, State Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow in Power Engineering, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Sri Sivasubramaniya Nadar College of Engineering
Language: English
Field: Energy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
Awards: G1560925846, G1598124517, G6093153847
OpenAlex ID: W3138248277