Abstract
Anaerobic digestion (AD) is an efficient technology for treating biowaste and generating biogas. A reasonable evaluation of AD performance is crucial to its development. Herein, a comprehensive evaluation system covering five dimensions (energy output, process stability, degradation efficiency, digestate fertility, and digestate safety) was established to assess AD performance. Each dimension in the evaluation system was assigned a specific indicator defined by a threshold or range. Additionally, the proposed evaluation system was applied to assess a case study of batch-mode mesophilic AD that employed three industrial waste residues as mineral accelerants (nickel‑iron slag, steel slag, and fly ash). The mineral accelerants enhanced the energy output (methane yield by 66.55 %–87.54 %) and the feedstock degradation (chemical oxygen demand removal ratio by 11.23 %–32.42 %). The digestates also retained promising safety (heavy metal contents of 190–1260 mg/kg) and fertility (total nutrient contents of 3.71 %–4.69 %). The evaluation system reasonably appraised the comprehensive performance of accelerant-enhanced AD systems with cow manure. This work provides a reliable methodology for evaluating and comparing the performance of different novel accelerants and can be applied to evaluate the comprehensive performance of large-scale biogas projects with cow manure.
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