Optimization of biogas generation using anaerobic digestion models and computational intelligence approaches

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Anaerobic digestion (AD) technology has become popular and is widely used due to its ability to produce renewable energy from wastes. The bioenergy produced in anaerobic digesters could be directly used as fuel, thereby reducing the release of biogas to the atmosphere. Due to the limited knowledge on the different process disturbances and microbial composition that are vital for the efficient operation of AD systems, models and control strategies with respect to external influences are needed without wasting time and resources. Different simple and complex mechanistic and data-driven modeling approaches have been developed to describe the processes taking place in the AD system. Microbial activities have been incorporated in some of these models to serve as a predictive tool in biological processes. The flexibility and power of computational intelligence of evolutionary algorithms (EAs) as direct search algorithms to solve multiobjective problems and generate Pareto-optimal solutions have also been exploited. Thus, this paper reviews state-of-the-art models based on the computational optimization methods for renewable and sustainable energy optimization. This paper discusses the different types of model approaches to enhance AD processes for bioenergy generation. The optimization and control strategies using EAs for advanced reactor performance and biogas production are highlighted. This information would be of interest to a dynamic group of researchers, including microbiologists and process engineers, thereby offering the latest research advances and importance of AD technology in the production of renewable energy.</jats:p>

Conversion of organic compounds into biogas on a full scale brewery WWTP using IC reactor

“…The amount of water needed to brew beer is several times the volume actually brewed. Large volumes of water are being used by the industry to produce beer for two distinct purposes: as the main ingredient of the beer itself and as part of the brewing process for steam raising, cooling, and washing of floors, packaging, cleaning of the brew house during and after the end of each batch operation [2]. The beer brewing process generates large amounts of wastewater.…”

The Future Agricultural Biogas Plant in Germany: A Vision

“…To control, manage and optimize the biogas plant performance while ensuring stable and efficient biogas production, various process models have been developed [60,61], resulting in a better understanding of the process dynamics, providing optimization opportunities and improvement of digester performance [4,34,54,61,62]. The available models for anaerobic digestion systems can be divided into mechanistic and empirical/data-driven models [60,61]. Mechanistic models are based on biological, chemical and/or physical laws governing the behavior of a process while trying to consider in which manner individual parts of the system are coupled.…”

“…The mostly used mechanistic model is the Anaerobic Digestion Model No. 1 (ADM 1) [60,61,63,64]. The ADM 1 as a dynamic model chiefly considers biochemical processes including the conversion of organic matter into carbohydrates, lipids, proteins and inert compounds as well as the four main process steps in terms of hydrolysis, acidogenesis, acetogenesis and methanogenesis including potential process inhibition by hydrogen and free ammonia [61].…”

Optimization of Bioethanol In Silico Production Process in a Fed-Batch Bioreactor Using Non-Linear Model Predictive Control and Evolutionary Computation Techniques

“…In this sense, several works presented models for bioenergy production processes through microbial activity, including biohydrogen generation [23][24][25], biogas (used directly, or refined as biomethane) production through anaerobic digestion [26][27][28], bioethanol production (through the biological conversion of sugar-containing crops, amilaceous raw inputs or lignocellulosic materials) [6,18,29], this latter subject appearing as the focal point of the present work.…”