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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Hilo, Hawaii » Daniel K. Inouye U.S. Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center » Tropical Plant Genetic Resources and Disease Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #308354
Title: Fungal pretreatment of albizia chips for enhanced biogas production by solid-state anaerobic digestion

Author
item GE, XUMENG - The Ohio State University
item MATSUMOTO BROWER, TRACIE
item KEITH, LISA
item LI, YEBO - The Ohio State University

Submitted to: Energy and Fuels
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 12/5/2014
Publication Date: 1/15/2015
Citation: Ge, X., Matsumoto Brower, T.K., Keith, L.M., Li, Y. 2015. Fungal pretreatment of albizia chips for enhanced biogas production by solid-state anaerobic digestion. Energy and Fuels. 29:200-204.

Interpretive Summary: Albizia is a fast growing invasive tree in Hawaii and produced abundant amounts of biomass. Anaerobic digestion (AD) occurs when microorganisms breakdown organic matter in the absence of oxygen. The end product of this process is biogas which can be used to produce heat, electricity, compressed natural gas (CNG) and liquefied natural gas (LNG). We had previous shown that for albizia wood chips result in low methane gas due to the complex make up of the material. Here we show that pretreating the wood chips with a white-rot fungus degraded the lignin in the albizia chips, increased the digestibility of the wood chip by the anaerobic microorganisms by 5 fold, and increased methane yield by 3.7 fold in solid state anaerobic digester. Suggesting that this may be a useful tool to utilize this abundant biomass.

Technical Abstract: Albizia biomass is a forestry waste, and holds a great potential in biogas production by solid-state anaerobic digestion (SS-AD). However, low methane yields from albizia chips were observed due to their recalcitrant structure. In this study, albizia chips were pretreated by Ceriporiopsis subvermispora, a white-rot fungus for enhanced biogas production by SS-AD. About 11% of volatile solids, and cellulose, 15% of hemicellulose, and 24% of lignin in albizia chips were degraded after 48 days of fungal pretreatment. The selective degradation of lignin in albizia chips resulted in a 5 fold increase of their digestibility. Furthermore, fungal pretreatment of albizia chips increased cumulative methane yield from 33.9 to 123.9 L kg-1 VS during 58 days of SS-AD. Degradation of volatile solids, cellulose, and hemicellulose in pretreated albizia chips was more than 4 times higher than in raw albizia chips during SS-AD.