Emission Characteristics of NOx and SO2 during the Combustion of Antibiotic Mycelial Residue.

Yaxin Ge,Guangyi Zhang,Lijie Cui,Jianling Zhang,Wennan Zhang

doi:10.3390/ijerph19031581

Abstract

The antibiotic mycelial residue (AMR) generated from cephalosporin C production is a hazardous organic waste, which is usually disposed of by landfilling that causes potential secondary environmental pollution. AMR combustion can be an effective method to treat AMR. In order to develop clean combustion technologies for safe disposal and energy recovery from various AMRs, the emission characteristics of NOx and SO2 from AMR combustion were studied experimentally in this work. It was found that the fuel-N is constituted by 85% protein nitrogen and 15% inorganic nitrogen, and the fuel-S by 78% inorganic sulfur and 22% organic sulfur. Nitrogen oxide emissions mainly occur at the volatile combustion stage when the temperature rises to 400 °C, while the primary sulfur oxide emission appears at the char combustion stage above 400 °C. Increasing the combustion temperature and airflow cause higher NOx emissions. High moisture content in AMR can significantly reduce the NOx emission by lowering the combustion temperature and generating more reducing gases such as CO. For the SO2 emission, the combustion temperature (700 to 900 °C), airflow and AMR water content do not seem to exhibit obvious effects. The presence of CaO significantly inhibits SO2 emission, especially for the SO2 produced during the AMR char combustion because of the good control effect on the direct emission of inorganic SO2. Employing air/fuel staging technologies in combination with in-situ desulfurization by calcium oxide/salts added in the combustor with operation temperatures lower than 900 °C should be a potential technology for the clean disposal of AMRs.

Highlights

Antibiotic mycelial residues (AMRs) are the wastes generated from fermentative processes in antibiotics production [1]
The occurrence of the first weak peak at 0–50 s might be explained by the devolatilization of the N-containing species, which is kept at a low level by the high concentration of CO and the reduction effect of CO on NOx (2NO + 2CO = N2 +2CO2 ) [16,37]
The emission characteristics of NOx and SO2 from AMR combustion were investigated as seen in Figure 7b, differing from the unimodal distribution for the dry samples

Summary

Introduction

Antibiotic mycelial residues (AMRs) are the wastes generated from fermentative processes in antibiotics production [1]. Around one million tons of AMRs are generated each year in China—the major antibiotic producer in the world [2]. AMRs mainly consist of mycelia, surplus fermentative substrates, flocculant agents, intermediate metabolites, and residual antibiotics. They were frequently used as animal feed and plant fertilizer due to their high nutrition content [3]. Catalog of Hazardous Wastes in China since 2008 [4], and various AMRs are forbidden as animal feed and plant fertilizer because residual antibiotics can accumulate in animals’ bodies, leading to the emergence of drug resistance [3,5,6].

Methods

Results

Conclusion