• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.29-36
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• 2021

In spite of the highest energy potential among all domestic organic solid wastes. the research on biogas production from cattle manure is limited. In particular, effects of organic content degradation and sawdust addition during storage on biomethane potential have never been investigated. In the present work, we investigated the change of organic content during storage of cattle manure under different temperatures (20℃ and 30℃), and its impact on biomethane potential and odor emissions. 90 days of investigation results showed that 10% of organics in terms of VS and COD were degraded at 20℃ during storage, while 30% were degraded at 30℃. This result impacted on biomethane potential, while 10-13% and 24% reduction were observed from beef and dairy cattle manure, respectively. The temperature also affected on CH4 and odor emissions during storage by 3.3-3.8 times and 29 times. The effect of sawdust on lowering down biomethane potential was found to be substantial, reducing 61-75% compared to the control.

• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.17-28
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• 2011

Biogas production and utilization are an emerging alternative energy technology. Biogas is produced from the biological breakdown of organic matter through anaerobic digestion. Biogas can be utilized for various energy sectors such as space heating, electricity generation and vehicle fuel. Especially, to be utilized as vehicle fuel, raw biogas needs to be upgraded that is mainly the removal of carbon dioxide to increase the methane content up to more than 95 ~ 97 vol% in some cases, similar to the composition of fossil-based natural gas. Usage of Biogas as a fuel of vehicles have an effect of reducing $CO_2$ emission compared to fossil fuels. Biomethane which is produced by upgrading of biogas is regarded as a good alternative energy and usage of clean energy is encouraged to deal with air pollution and waste management as well as production of clean energy. Recently, biogas projects for vehicle fuel are newly being launched and Korea government have also announced a plan for investment to develop biogas as a transport fuel. In this study, it is aimed to examine the potential feasibility of biomethane as a transport fuel. As a results, the status of biomethane, quality standard, quality characteristics, and upgrading technology of biogas were investigated to evaluate of biogas as a vehicle fuel of transportation.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.55-60
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• 2014

Food waste leachate (FWL) is a serious pollutant waste coming from the food waste recycling facilities in Korea. FWL has a high organic matter content and high COD to nitrogen (COD/N) ratio, which can disturb efficient methane production in the anaerobic digestion of FWL. In the present study a microalga, Clorella vulgaris (C.V), was used as co-substrate for the FWL anaerobic digestion in order to supply nutrients, decrease the COD/N ratio and increase its methane yield. Different co-digestion mixtures (COD/N ratios) were studied by using biochemical methane potential test and modified Gompertz equation for kinetic study. Mixed substrate of FWL and C. vulgaris in the co-digestion clearly showed more the biomethane yield than the sole substrates. The maximum methane production, 827.7 mL-$CH_4$/g-VS added, was obtained for COD/N ratio of 24/1, whereas the highest improvement of methane yield was found for COD/N ratio of 15/1.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.864-873
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• 2013

In developing countries, biogas energy production is seen as a technology that can provide clean energy in poor regions and reduce pollution caused by animal manure. Laboratories in these countries have little access to advanced gas measuring equipment, which may limit research aimed at improving local adapted biogas production. They may also be unable to produce valid estimates of an international standard that can be used for articles published in international peer-reviewed science journals. This study tested and validated methods for measuring total biogas and methane ($CH_4$) production using batch fermentation and for characterizing the biomass. The biochemical methane potential (BMP) ($CH_4$ NL $kg^{-1}$ VS) of pig manure, cow manure and cellulose determined with the Moller and VDI methods was not significantly different in this test (p>0.05). The biodegradability using a ratio of BMP and theoretical BMP (TBMP) was slightly higher using the Hansen method, but differences were not significant. Degradation rate assessed by methane formation rate showed wide variation within the batch method tested. The first-order kinetics constant k for the cumulative methane production curve was highest when two animal manures were fermented using the VDI 4630 method, indicating that this method was able to reach steady conditions in a shorter time, reducing fermentation duration. In precision tests, the repeatability of the relative standard deviation (RSDr) for all batch methods was very low (4.8 to 8.1%), while the reproducibility of the relative standard deviation (RSDR) varied widely, from 7.3 to 19.8%. In determination of biomethane concentration, the values obtained using the liquid replacement method (LRM) were comparable to those obtained using gas chromatography (GC). This indicates that the LRM method could be used to determine biomethane concentration in biogas in laboratories with limited access to GC.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.21-31
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• 2015

The aim of this study is to determine the removal efficiency of total nitrogen and phosphorus from treated swine wastewater by Phragmites australis and Miscanthus sacchariflorus var Geode Uksae-1, and to determine its biomass total energy value and biomethane potential. Plants were grown with a bedding mixture either soil and sand or soil, sand, and bioceramic. Treeated swine wastewater with Total nitrogen (TN) and Total phosphorus (TP) of 222.78 mg/L and 66.11 mg/L, respectively, was utilized. The TN and TP removal is higher in the bio-ceramic-soil-sand bedding media treatment. The highest TN removal of 96.14% was performed by Miscanthus sacchariflorus var Geode Uksae-1, but the elemental analysis shows that Phragmites australis contains more nitrogen than Miscanthus sacchariflorus var Geode Uksae-1, indicating higher nitrogen uptake. The highest TP removal of 98.12% was performed by Phragmites australis. The cellulose content of the plant grown with the bioceramic-soil-sand bedding was approximately 3-6% higher than that of the plant grown in the soil-sand bedding. Different growing substrates may have an effect on the fiber content of plants. The biomethane potential of the produced biomass of the plants was between 57.01 and $99.25L-CH_4/kg$ VS. The lignin content is believed to inhibit the breakdown of plant biomass, resulting in the lowest methane production in the Phragmites australis grown in the soil-sand bedding media.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2020

Hydrogen production from biogas has received consistent attention due to the great potential to solve simultaneously the issues of energy demands and environmental problems. Practically, biomethane produced by purification/upgrading of biogas can be a good alternative to the natural gas which is a main reactant for a steam methane reforming process. Judging from the economic and environmental impacts, however, the steam biogas and dry reforming are considered to be more effective routes for hydrogen production because both processes do not require the carbon dioxide elimination step. Herein, we highlight recent studies of hydrogen production via reforming processes using biogas and effective applications for earlier commercialization.

• Journal of Korea Society of Waste Management
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• v.34 no.5
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• pp.474-481
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• 2017

This study was conducted to investigate the effects of inoculum and carbon sources on anaerobic digestion characteristics. The treatments were combinations of inoculum (digestate of cattle manure and rumen fluid) with carbon sources (starch, cellulose, and xylan). Anaerobic digestion was performed in triplicate at $37^{\circ}C$ for 18 days at 100 rpm. Sampling was performed at 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 12, 15, and 18 days to measure pH, ammonia-N, volatile solids reduction, the cumulative methane content, and the cumulative methane production. There was a significant difference in methane content depending on the carbon source and there was a significant difference in pH, ammonia-N, methane production, and methane content depending on the inoculum (P < 0.05). The results of methane production were higher in the digestate of cattle manure treatment than in the rumen fluid treatment (P < 0.05). In this study, different digestive patterns depending on the type of carbon source could be used as basic research data to set the hydraulic residence time of anaerobic digestion facilities. In addition, the use of ruminal fluid as an inoculum may help accelerate the hydrolysis and acid production steps.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.126-134
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• 2016

To produce renewable biomethane from biogas, the properties of physical absorbents such as water, methanol, 1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP), poly(ethylene glycol) dimethylether (PEGDME), and propylene carbonate (PC) were studied, and PC was applied to membrane contactor systems. Among physical absorbents, PC exhibited a high contact angle of $58.3^{\circ}$ on polypropylene surface, and a PC/water mixture (5 wt%) increased the contact angle to $90^{\circ}$. Furthermore, the PC/water mixture presented higher $CO_2$ absorption capacities (0.148-0.157 mmol/g) than that of water (0.121 mmol/g), demonstrating a good property as an absorbent for membrane contactors. Actual operations in membrane contactors using the PC/water mixture resulted in $CO_2$ removal of 98.0-97.8% with biomethane purities of 98.5-98.3%, presenting a strong potential for biogas treatment. However, the PC/water mixture yielded moderate improved in $CO_2$ removal and methane recovery, as compared with water in the membrane contactor operation. This is originated from insufficient desorption processes to reuse absorbent and low $CO_2$ flux of the PC/water absorbent. Thus, it is requiring optimizations of membrane contactor technology including development of absorbent and improvement of operation process.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.588-597
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• 2016

In this study, we attempted to improve the biogas production efficiency by varying the mixing ratio of the mixed sludge of organic wastes in the improved single-phase anaerobic digestion process. The types of organic waste used in this study were raw sewage sludge, food wastewater leachate and livestock excretions. The biomethane potential was determined through the BMP test. The results showed that the biomethane potential of the livestock excretions was the highest at $1.55m^3CN4/kgVS$, and that the highest value of the composite sample, containing primary sludge, food waste leachate and livestock excretions at proportions of 50%, 30% and 20% respectively) was $0.43m^3CN4/kgVS$. On the other hand, the optimal mixture ratio of composite sludge in the demonstration plant was 68.5 (raw sludge) : 18.0 (food waste leachate) : 13.5 (livestock excretions), which was a somewhat different result from that obtained in the BMP test. This difference was attributed to the changes in the composite sludge properties and digester operating conditions, such as the retention time. The amount of biogas produced in the single-phase anaerobic digestion process was $2,514m^3/d$ with a methane content of 62.8%. Considering the value of $2,319m^3/d$ of biogas produced as its design capacity, it was considered that this process demonstrated the maximum capacity. Also, through this study, it was shown that, in the case of the anaerobic digestion process, the two-phase digestion process is better in terms of its stable tank operation and high efficiency, whereas the existing single-phase digestion process allows for the improvement of the digestion efficiency and performance.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.11a
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• pp.101-101
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• 2010

Anaerobic digestion(AD) is the most promising method for treating and recycling of different organic wastes, such as organic fraction of municipal solid waste, household wastes, animal manure, agro-industrial wastes, industrial organic wastes and sewage sludge. During AD, i.e. organic materials are decomposed by anaerobic forming bacteria and fina1ly converted to excellent fertilizer and biogas which is a mixture of carbon dioxide and methane. AD has been one of the leading technologies that can make a large contribution to produce renewable energy and to reduce $CO_2$ and other green-house gas(GHG) emission, it is becoming a key method for both waste treatment and recovery of a renewable fuel and other valuable co-products. Currently some 80% of the world's overall energy supply of about 400 EJ per year in derived from fossil fuels. Nevertheless roughly 10~15% of this demand is covered by biomass resources, making biomass by far the most important renewable energy source used to date. The representative biofuels produced from the biomass are bioethanol, biodiesel and biogas, and currently biogas plays a smaller than other biofuels but steadily growing role. Traditionally anaerobic digestion applied for different biowaste e.g. sewage sludge, manure, other organic wastes treatment and stabilization, biogas has become a well established energy resource. However, the biowaste are fairly limited in respect to the production and utilization as renewable source, but the plant biomass, the so called "energy crops" are used for more biogas production in EU countries and the investigation on the biomethane potential of different crops and plant materials have been carried out. In Korea, with steadily increasing oil prices and improved environmental regulations, since 2005 anaerobic digestion was again stimulated, especially on the biogasification of different biowastes and agro-industrial biomass including "energy crops". This study have been carried out to investigate anaerobic biodegradability by the biochemical methane potential(BMP) test of animal manures, different forage crops i.e. "energy crops", plant and industrial organic wastes in the condition of thermophilic temperature, The biodegradability of animal manure were 63.2% and 58.2% with $315m^3CH_4/tonVS$ of cattle slurry and $370m^3CH_4/tonVS$ of pig slurry in ultimate methane yields. Those of winter forage crops were the range 75% to 87% with ultimate methane yield of $378m^3CH_4/tonVS$ to $450m^3CH_4/tonVS$ and those of summer forage crops were the range 81% to 85% with ultimate methane yield of $392m^3CH_4/tonVS$ to $415m^3CH_4/tonVS$. The forge crops as "energy crops" could be used as good renewable energy source to increase methane production and to improve biodegradability in co-digestion with animal manure or only energy crop digestion.