EVALUATION OF BIOGAS PRODUCTION FROM HOUSEHOLD AND FARM WASTES USING DRY AND WET FERMENTATION

An experiment under laboratory scale was conducted in the Biogas Laboratory at Testing and Research Station of Tractor and Agriculture Machinery, Alexandria. The study was done to evaluate the biogas production rate and methane content (CH4) for batch anaerobic digestion under two types of wastes (household and farm) at three levels of temperature (60, 40 and ambient ⁰C) using two fermentation types (wet and dry). The wastes were analyzed for chemical characteristics such as total solids, volatile solids, organic carbon, nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus percentage. The obtained results clear that: 1- The best temperature was 60 ⁰C, which gave the maximum biogas production rate (6.75 L/day), cumulative (119.95 L) and methane percentage (63.66%) and minimum retention time (35 days). Followed by temperature of 40 ⁰C and ambient temperature, respectively. 2- The best fermentation type was the wet fermentation (10% TS), which gave the highest biogas production rate, cumulative and minimum retention time as compared with dry fermentation (30% TS). 3- The farm wastes gave the highest biogas production rates, cumulative and minimum retention time compared with household wastes.