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<div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Message to Tom Miles, Can you share any of the publications on the use of biochar in AD? I have only used biochar for a three-week trial, primarily to test the capture of H2S in the liquid phase. Results after two weeks were promising; H2S was bound with results similar to adding ferric chloride. And we saw a slight increase in the methane concentration. The reactors were CSTR and the biochar was supplemented daily. I lost access to the data I collected unfortunately when I changed jobs.</div><div><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Many thanks,</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Doug Renk</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Madison Wisconsin</div>
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On Monday, November 8, 2021, 06:02:25 AM EST, Anand Karve <adkarve@gmail.com> wrote:
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<div><div id="yiv2923745767"><div><div> In the case of soil bacteria, the soil provides them with all the minerals that they need but it is C that they lack. I discovered in 2010 that the soil bacteria proliferated when sugar was added to the soil. In the case of a biogas digester using food waste as feedstock, the bacteria have access to a lot of C but the minerals are a limiting factor. By introducing soil into the digester, the bacteria get all the minerals that they need.<div>Yours A.D.Karve</div></div><br clear="none"><div class="yiv2923745767gmail_quote"><div id="yiv2923745767yqtfd85522" class="yiv2923745767yqt6599914603"><div dir="ltr" class="yiv2923745767gmail_attr">On Mon 8 Nov, 2021, 4:52 AM , <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com" target="_blank" href="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com">tmiles@trmiles.com</a>> wrote:<br clear="none"></div><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;" class="yiv2923745767gmail_quote"><div lang="EN-US" style="word-wrap:break-word;"><div class="yiv2923745767m_-7771969211998200147WordSection1"><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Interesting conclusions. There are now many peer reviewed papers on biochar addition to digesters. Result vary according to biochar feedstock, processing conditions, and likely with digester feed such as food waste or biosolids. Positive results in solids removal, COD removal, methane production and ammonia nitrogen reduction have stimulated further research. <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><br clear="none">Tom<u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div style="border:none;border-top:solid #e1e1e1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in;"><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> Digestion <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org">digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org</a>> <b>On Behalf Of </b>Anand Karve<br clear="none"><b>Sent:</b> Sunday, November 07, 2021 8:31 AM<br clear="none"><b>To:</b> For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org">digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org</a>><br clear="none"><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Digestion] Test Message<u></u><u></u></p></div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">We had filled the biochar into a nylon net-bag and placed the bag into the digester. In this way, the biochar remained in the digester as long as we wanted it to be there. The bag was removed from the digester only after we found that the biochar was no longer effective. We do not recommend application of biochar to a biogas digester. The experiment was conducted only to find out how the biochar affected the performance of a biogas plant. Now that I know the role played by biochar as a donor of minerals, we are using ordinary field soil instead of biochar. The universal presence of green plants in nature shows that all soils in the world have all the minerals that living beings need.<u></u><u></u></p><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Yours<u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">A.D.Karve<u></u><u></u></p></div></div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">On Sun 7 Nov, 2021, 1:55 PM , <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com" target="_blank" href="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com">tmiles@trmiles.com</a>> wrote:<u></u><u></u></p></div><blockquote style="border:none;border-left:solid #cccccc 1.0pt;padding:0in 0in 0in 6.0pt;margin-left:4.8pt;margin-right:0in;"><div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">AD, <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">It is great to hear from you. Many thanks for your observations and experience with biochar. The digesters that we know of that are adding biochar to food waste find that there are a number of benefits as you have experienced. They feed the biochar to the digester continuously along with the food waste and remove it with the digestate. They probably benefit from the minerals as well as pH buffering. As far as I know the biochar does not accumulate in the digester. What we have seen so far are results from experiments at the lab scale and reports from some industrial scale use. We haven’t heard of biochar being used on the household scale. I wonder if others on the list have added biochar to digesters. <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Kind regards, <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><br clear="none">Tom <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><div style="border:none;border-top:solid #e1e1e1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in;"><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> Digestion <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org">digestion-bounces@lists.bioenergylists.org</a>> <b>On Behalf Of </b>Anand Karve<br clear="none"><b>Sent:</b> Saturday, November 06, 2021 10:33 PM<br clear="none"><b>To:</b> For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org">digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org</a>><br clear="none"><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Digestion] Test Message<u></u><u></u></p></div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Glad to hear from you and also glad to know that the list is still surviving. I am still working on food waste and kitchen waste as feedstock. One of the drawbacks of this feedstock was that one could load the digester with only a small quantity of feedstock at a time. But with our new design, we have overcome this problem. Now we load all the feedstock into a predigester. Because of overloading, the pH of the material in the predigester becomes acidic, but the new design is such, that the digester draws in only so much of the acid, as can be converted by it into biogas.<u></u><u></u></p><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Adding bichar certainly works, but only temporarily. The digester filled with biochar produced three times as much biogas as was possible without the biochar, but only for three months,. After 3 months we had to open the digester and load it again with fresh biochar. This indicated that food waste does not have enough minerals and that the ash in the biochar served the bacteria as a source of minerals. One can as well add chemical fertilizers to the digester to achieve the same results.<u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Yours<u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">A.D.Karve<u></u><u></u></p></div></div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">On Sun 7 Nov, 2021, 3:31 AM , <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com" target="_blank" href="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com">tmiles@trmiles.com</a>> wrote:<u></u><u></u></p></div><blockquote style="border:none;border-left:solid #cccccc 1.0pt;padding:0in 0in 0in 6.0pt;margin-left:4.8pt;margin-top:5.0pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:5.0pt;"><div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Thanks! A lot has happened in anaerobic digestion since the list was last active last Spring. <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><ol start="1" type="1"><li class="yiv2923745767m_-7771969211998200147m-7172047680366109882m4540393590755396650msolistparagraph">RNG. While we only have a small number of commercial digesters in the US compared with Europe there is a lot of excitement about Renewable Natural Gas, especially from the American Biogas Council. They report that there are 161 digesters that are now selling RNG and that there is a potential for something like 2000. The contracts for RNG appear attractive but it is not yet clear what the net benefit is to the owner after complex transaction fees are subtracted. <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" target="_blank" href="https://americanbiogascouncil.org/">https://americanbiogascouncil.org/</a><u></u><u></u></li></ol><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><ol start="2" type="1"><li class="yiv2923745767m_-7771969211998200147m-7172047680366109882m4540393590755396650msolistparagraph">Food wastes are another emerging feedstock for AD in the US, almost as a pre-treatment for composting the digestate. <u></u><u></u></li></ol><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><ol start="3" type="1"><li class="yiv2923745767m_-7771969211998200147m-7172047680366109882m4540393590755396650msolistparagraph">Research has demonstrated the value of adding biochar to AD feedstock with a variety of benefits but we don’t see commercial use of biochar yet in AD either as a digester additive or as an additive to digestate prior to composting. <u></u><u></u></li></ol><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Tom <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><div><div style="border:none;border-top:solid #e1e1e1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in;"><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> Bruno M. <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:brunom1@telenet.be" target="_blank" href="mailto:brunom1@telenet.be">brunom1@telenet.be</a>> <br clear="none"><b>Sent:</b> Saturday, November 06, 2021 2:31 PM<br clear="none"><b>To:</b> For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion <<a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org">digestion@lists.bioenergylists.org</a>>; <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com" target="_blank" href="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com">tmiles@trmiles.com</a><br clear="none"><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Digestion] Test Message<u></u><u></u></p></div></div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">yep, works perfect Tom.<u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">================================<u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Op 6-11-2021 om 21:02 schreef <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com" target="_blank" href="mailto:tmiles@trmiles.com">tmiles@trmiles.com</a>:<u></u><u></u></p></div><blockquote style="margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt;"><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">This is a test to see if the list is still available<u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Tom Miles<u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">Digestion list Owner<u></u><u></u></p><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><p style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;" class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p><pre>_______________________________________________<u></u><u></u></pre><pre>Digestion mailing list<u></u><u></u></pre><pre> <u></u><u></u></pre></blockquote><p class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p></div></div><p style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;" class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">_______________________________________________<br clear="none">Digestion mailing list<br clear="none"><br clear="none">to Send a Message to the list, use the email address<br clear="none"><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org">Digestion@bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page<br clear="none"><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org">http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">for more information about digestion, see the Biogas Wiki <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://biogas.wikispaces.com/">http://biogas.wikispaces.com/</a><u></u><u></u></p></blockquote></div></div></div><p style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;" class="yiv2923745767MsoNormal">_______________________________________________<br clear="none">Digestion mailing list<br clear="none"><br clear="none">to Send a Message to the list, use the email address<br clear="none"><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org" target="_blank" href="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org">Digestion@bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page<br clear="none"><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org">http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">for more information about digestion, see the Biogas Wiki <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://biogas.wikispaces.com/">http://biogas.wikispaces.com/</a><u></u><u></u></p></blockquote></div></div></div>_______________________________________________<br clear="none">
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</div></div></div><div class="yqt6599914603" id="yqtfd23637">_______________________________________________<br clear="none">Digestion mailing list<br clear="none"><br clear="none">to Send a Message to the list, use the email address<br clear="none"><a shape="rect" ymailto="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org" href="mailto:Digestion@bioenergylists.org">Digestion@bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page<br clear="none"><a shape="rect" href="http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org" target="_blank">http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none">for more information about digestion, see the Biogas Wiki <a shape="rect" href="http://biogas.wikispaces.com/" target="_blank">http://biogas.wikispaces.com/</a><br clear="none"><br clear="none"></div></div>
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