Novel insight into enhanced recoverability of acidic inhibition to anaerobic digestion with nano-bubble water supplementation

Abstract

Nano-bubble water (NBW) has been proven to be effective in promoting organics utilization and CH4 production during anaerobic digestion (AD) process, suggesting its potential in improving the stability of the AD process and thereby alleviating acidic inhibition. In this work, the effect of NBW on digestion stability and CH4 production was investigated to evaluate the ability of NBW on AD recovery from acidic inhibition. Results showed that NBW supplementation increased the total alkalinity (TA) and partial alkalinity (PA), and reduced the ratio of VFA/TA, thus maintained the stability of the AD process. Generation/consumption of VFAs was also enhanced with NBW supplementation under acidic inhibition with pH values of 5.5, 6.0 and 6.5. The cumulative CH4 production was 246–257 mL/g-VS in NBW groups, which was 12.1–17.2% higher than the control. Moreover, with NBW supplementation, the maximum CH4 production rate was raised according to the modeling results.