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The provision of nutrients and organic matter to arable soils is critical to facilitate an intensive agriculture and secure long-term soil functionality. Municipal organic waste (MOW) is rich in nutrients and organic matter and its recycling onto agricultural lands presents a promising alternative to conventional fertilizers. In comparison to common aerobic treatment, the application of the biogas technology enables the recovery of both energy and soil amendments. The introduction of a mandatory separate collection in Germany in 2015 reflects the political will to increase MOW recovery rates and facilitates its utilization as feedstock in biogas plants. However, MOW is a challenging feedstock as its composition varies and it is often contaminated with impurities such as plastics and metals. The two-stage anaerobic digestion process with dry fermentation is very robust and offers possibilities for process control so that no extensive MOW pretreatment is required. To close nutrient circles, remaining digestates shall be processed to soil amendments, which can be redistributed to arable land. However, less is known about digestate properties from two-stage digestion of MOW and how they are influenced during the treatment process. Furthermore, only scarce information on nutrient recovery rates and the accumulation of elements during processing is available. Therefore, this thesis investigates the development of digestate properties during anaerobic and subsequent aerobic treatment at laboratory and semi-industrial scale. During a first experiment, changes in nutrient and heavy metal concentration in the solid digestate were monitored during anaerobic treatment of MOW in a two-stage laboratory biogas plant. A second investigation related amendment properties of MOW digestate of one origin to different post-treatment procedures. The impact of drying, composting and sieving on final digestate properties and specifically nutrient availability and heavy metal and carbon elution was evaluated. A third experimental approach investigated total material and substance flows during treatment of source-separated MOW in a semi-industrial scale two-stage biogas plant and subsequent digestate composting including impurities removal.
In this study, the aims were to investigate the die-off levels of pathogens attainable under conventional biotreatments, introduce alternative hygienization options and study their performance at eliminating pathogens from biowaste. In addition, the study investigated feasibility of biotreatment of potato peels waste (PPW) as management option for the peels waste generated in Dar es Salaam city. Pathogens inactivation studies using simulated biowaste (moisture ˃77%w/w) composed of PPW spiked with Escherichia coli and Salmonella senftenbergensis at laboratory-scale resulted into low temperature-time patterns of the aerobic In-vessel composting system and turned the process anaerobic thus demonstrated inefficiency at eliminating the spiked bacteria. Likewise, two-phase anaerobic digestion at continuous stirred tank reactor confirmed incapable at effecting complete inactivation of the bacteria unless substrate residence is prolonged above 72hrs. These distasteful confirmations inevitably advocate the importance of applying either pre- and/or post-biotreatment hygienization processes on biowaste for safer biotreatments. Existing hygienization options including acid/lime conditioning and batch pasteurization were applied, their hygienization efficacy investigated and the latter validated. Acetic acid treatment of biowaste at pH value 4 for 5days or lime treatment at pH value 11-12 for 1day brought complete die-off in E. coli and S. senftenbergensis. Temperature-time combination at 65°C for 30min was sufficient at effecting ˃1log cycle die-off of the spiked enteropathogens with z-Value of 11˚C for S. senftenbergensis hence validates the temperature-time regime of 70˚C for 30min and 70˚C for 60min set by U.S-EPA/625/R-92/013 and Regulations (EC) No. 208/2006 respectively. In addition, alternative hygienization options namely UV radiation and passive solar heating (PSH) were proposed, applied and evaluated. Modes of application and achievable bacteria die-off for all hygienization options are given in Chapter 2 to 6 of this document. Owing to its small investment capital (mostly do yourself construction), independence from fuel supplies and low running costs, the study highly recommend PSH as environmental friendly and economic viable pre- and post- biotreatment hygienization option especially for tropical climates and developing countries with adequate sunshine. In vessel co-composting of PPW with yard-waste at 6:1 ratio gave microbiologically safe and good quality compost. Endowed with higher CO2 removal, mesophilic/thermophilic two-phase anaerobic processing of PPW showed comparable results to biogasification from other biowaste. Biogas productivity from PPW was 2.3lNbiogas/l.day with an average CH4 yield of 0.13-0.35m3/kgoTS input having 58% CH4. The digestion resulted into H2S removal from above LoQ to less than 230ppm with 81% VS removal at substrate OLR of 2.4kgoTS/m3.day input without sign of inhibition. It is estimated that 1.0m3biogas with 5hrs burning potential and equivalent to 3.5kg firewood can be produced from 10.2kg of PPW anaerobic digested. The resulting biogas production would complement household energy need thus conserve forest resources which are subjected to high deforestation rate estimated at 4.1kilotons of wood per day as fuelwood. Digestate resulting from the anaerobic reactors would make valuable fertilizer to urban agriculture thus enhance soil fertility and productivity.