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31 Critical Issues That Can Underpin the Drive for Sustainable Anaerobic Biorefinery

15.8%

9.27 Nm³

49.2%

28.9 Nm³

25.6%

15.0 Nm³

1.4%

0.8 Nm³

Figure 31.2

Biogas production in North America, Europe, China, and India. All values in

billion Nm³ in 2014. Source: Based on WBA [15].

Significant economic value of biogas

Societal value and entrepreneurial

potential

Permitting eco-friendly waste

treatment

Unrelenting focus on sustainable practices

Environmentally-friendly waste treatment

technique

Green value of the digestate – biofertilizer – in

agriculture.

Subsidy framework

Anaerobic

biorefinery

Process optimization through

parameters monitoring e.g.

temperature, pH, organic load, HRT are

indicators of the stability of the reactor.

Metagenomics allow the monitoring of

microbiomes dynamics within the

bioreactor

Value-added products

Consistent supply of biogas to boost

green bioeconomy

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Figure 31.3

Aspects for a sustainable anaerobic biorefinery.

an economic constraint. The anaerobic biorefinery is a promising concept, in which

the anaerobic reactor/digester acts as a centerpiece for bioconversion of feedstocks

(substrates) into diverse high-value products and intermediates (Figure 31.3). AD

technology has several inherent merits such as remediation of highly putrescible

organic wastes at a smaller environmental footprint, capturing GHGs, and at the

same time valorizing organic wastes into high-value products/chemicals and inter-

mediates.

Diverse organic materials ranging from industrial wastewaters to municipal and

farm wastes could be used as feedstocks in an anaerobic biorefinery to produce bio-

gas with concomitant generation of digestate (i.e. solid residue and liquid effluent).