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Updated: Jul 16, 2025

Evaluation of Integrated Anaerobic Digestion and Hydrothermal Carbonization for Bioenergy Production
Published on: June 15, 2014
Evaluation of activated pyrochar for boosting anaerobic digestion: Performances and microbial community
Ruixia Shen1, Zonglu Yao1, Jiadong Yu1
1Key Laboratory of Agricultural Green and Low-carbon for North China Plain, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Institute of Environment and Sustainable Development in Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China.
Abstract:
In this study, the effects of CO2-activated/non-activated pyrochars (PCs) from cornstalk, cotton straw, and rice straw on anaerobic digestion (AD) performances and microbial characteristics were investigated. The maximum biogas production rate (2.2 L/L/d) with a methane content of 73% was obtained from the AD with CO2-activated cotton straw PC. The activated PC mainly played a strengthening role in the early and middle stages of AD. Specifically, the cornstalk PC could greatly relieve acid inhibition, and cotton straw PC had a significantly positive effect on the regulation of ammonia nitrogen concentration. The rare genera like Verrucomicrobia had obvious differences among groups of AD with PCs. Regarding differential metabolites, cornstalk PC-N2 displayed a positive correlation with isoleucyl-alanine, while exhibiting a negative correlation with deoxyinosine, and the corresponding relative expression levels were + 3.0 and -2.4, respectively. Overall, gas-activated PCs could promote methane production and affect the composition of microbial community.
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