Dry fermentation

Dry fermentation

Loading

Municipal solid waste is loaded into the garage-type batch reactor by front loaders or trucks. Fermentation occurs without adding fresh substrates. This process is repeated regularly.

Percolating

After loading the substrates, the reactor doors are hermetically sealed. The biomass inside is irrigated by nozzles with recirculating effluent liquid. Biogas is collected and pumped out.

Heating

Substrates are heated by pipes mounted in the walls and bottom of the reactor.

Digestion

Anaerobic bacteria digest substrates, producing biogas.

Percolate accumulation

The percolate is accumulated in a pit and pumped out by a pump.

Percolate return

The percolate is pumped out from the pit and accumulated in a percolate tank.

Biogas storage

Biogas is collected in a gasholder

Biogas conditioning

The biogas is then dried in the chiller to remove moisture and pressurised by a gas compressor. Sulfur is removed by means of an activated charcoal filter.

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01
Loading
02
Percolating
03
Heating
04
Digestion
05
Percolate accumulation
06
Percolate return
07
Biogas storage
08
Biogas conditioning
09

Technology Description

Strictly speaking, no technology is dry. Fermentation always requires moisture. The method is called “dry” in comparison with other technologies since the mass is not pumped and is not blended with mixers.

The reactor is a reinforced concrete garage-type box. With the dry method, there are no mixers and the mass does not move, but instead, the mass is irrigated with percolate. Percolate seeps through the mass, accumulates, and is pumped back into the percolate tank. Heating pipes are mounted inside the reactor’s walls and base.

The technology is characterized by low power consumption and low maintenance costs. In addition to the garage door itself and the percolate and gas system, there is practically no other equipment such as mixers, pumps, or loaders.

The system is excellent for municipal solid waste (MSW), which contains a large amount of inclusions such as metal, plastic, and paper. These inclusions lead to frequent equipment breakdowns with other types of biogas technology. On the contrary, the contamination of raw materials in the dry method allows percolate to flow through the waste and is a necessary condition to work. In other biogas technologies, an expensive ultra-sorting and waste compaction module is required to avoid mixer and pump damage. And in the case of the dry batch method only, rough pre-sorting or no sorting is necessary.

Distinctive features:

  • a garage-type reactor
  • periodic operation without daily addition of fresh substrates
  • no loading or mixing devices
  • low power consumption up to just 3% of generation
  • low maintenance costs. There is nothing to break
  • highly polluted with impurities feedstock
500 kW to 30 MW
power capacity

Suitable substrates:

  • municipal solid waste
  • supermarket and food waste

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