Abstract
The aim of this work is the development of a methodology for the technical and environmental assessment of biowaste valorization in 2G biorefineries. Italy was chosen as case study, considering years 2016–2017. Approach: the Italian context was evaluated through the following key parameters: Gross domestic power, climate, demography, and population density distribution described the Italian framework. The four most abundant biowaste categories were defined through their amounts and geo-localization: wastewater and sewage sludge (WSS, 4.06 Mt/y), organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW, 1.7 Mt/y), agricultural livestock waste (ALW, 5.7 Mt/y), and waste deriving from the food industry (FIW, 2.6 Mt/y). The geo-localization and quantitative evaluations of the available biowaste amounts were aimed at defining the dimension and localization of the biorefinery plant and at optimizing supply and transport chains, while the qualitative characteristic were aimed to evaluate the most promising process among thermo-valorization (TH) and anaerobic digestion (AD). Results: All considered biowastes were appropriate for biorefinery processes, since carbon content exceeds 40% and the carbon–nitrogen ratio was between 10 and 30. All biowaste categories were evaluated as feedstocks for two biorefinery processes: anaerobic digestion (AD) and thermo-valorization (TH) with energy recovery. Compared to TH, AD achieved in all cases the best performances in terms of produced energy and avoided CO2 emissions. The primary energy production of AD and TH for WSS, OFMSW, ALW, and FIW were respectively: 7.89 vs. 2.4 kWh/kg; 8.7 vs. 2.6 kWh/kg; 10.85 vs. 5.5 kWh/kg; and 12.5 vs. 7.8 kWh/kg. The main findings of this work were: the adoption of AD was technically more suitable than TH; AD increased the avoided CO2 emissions of 10%–89.9% depending on biowaste category.
Highlights
Our society depends on fossil fuels for the production of over 80% of energy and 90% of platform chemicals [1]
The present study was carried out in Italy, which was analyzed under three complementary perspectives: geographical and climate areas division, by means of Köppen classification [11]; demographic distribution, described through national reference statistics [12] based on years 2016–2017; economic development, considering gross domestic product (GDP), which measure the income and output for a given country’s economy and it is equal to the total expenditures for all final goods and services produced within the country in a defined period of time, usually 1 year [9,13]
The main findings of the technical and environmental assessments were the following: compared to TH, anaerobic digestion (AD) achieved the best performances in terms of produced energy and avoided CO2 emissions
Summary
Our society depends on fossil fuels for the production of over 80% of energy and 90% of platform chemicals [1]. The fossil fuel consumption entails greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions, depletion of non-renewable resources and increase of extraction costs and purchase of fuels. In 2015 EU joined the 2030 Agenda, which established 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) related to socio-economic and health issues, clean energy and water, climate change mitigation, responsible production, and consumption. The SDGs concerning climate change mitigation and energy use are: GHG reduction equal to 40% of the levels of 1990; at least 27% of the used energy has to come from renewable energy and 27% energy savings compared to current situation [5]. The main contributes to GHG emissions are from Asia (30%), USA (15%), Europe (10%), and India (6.5%) [6]
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