Bio-Hydrogen Production via Dark Fermentation of Food Waste
Abstract:
Our group has created a plan for extracting hydrogen through dark fermentation from a food waste feedstock with a processing rate of 141,520,000 kg/yr. A useful glucose percentage of 36% was considered a fair estimate to be achieved, with the assumption that 60% of the food waste collected is considered a glucose substrate. The feedstock will go through an acid hydrolysis and heat pretreatment and will then be mixed with water and bacteria culture in a bioreactor series. The off gases will be purified into a CO2 stream and H2 stream. The waste slurry will recover any volatile fatty acids for further purification or reforming, with the solid waste will be partially recycled into the reactor stream. The volatile fatty acid and water mixed stream will be sent to a series of distillation columns for purification. For further hydrogen recovery, the pure acetic acid will be mixed with steam and reformed. The principal waste product of this process is the spent food waste which can be composted or used as a fertilizer. Carbon dioxide is also produced within this process but can be sequestered given that the use of underground storage is available within the plant's region of operation.
Students:
- Adrian Hucal
- Lena Szykowski
- Jacob Hardwick
- Luke Fior
- Sydney Cheresnuik
- Sebastian Cook
