Characteristics of Anaerobic Fermentation with Different Parts of Corn Stalks at Low Concentrations

Abstract

In order to obtain the characteristics of anaerobic fermentation with different parts of corn stalks at low concentrations, air-dried corn stalks stem bark (SB), stem pith (SP), leaves (L), and corn stalks (CS) were, respectively, mixed with cow dung to perform fermentation at the temperature of 35 ^oC and carbon-to-nitrogen ratio (C/N) of 25. Mixed with cow dung compost, the fermentation broths were adjusted to a neutral pH value. Along with the enhancing of the total solid (TS) content of SB, SP, L, and CS fermentation broths, both of the daily biogas yields and methane contents increased under the same fermentation condition, except for Sample TS 6% of L. The optimal TS content of SB, SP, L, and CS broth is 8%, 5%, 10%, and 8%, separately. In 35 days, the highest methane yield of SB, SP, L, and CS broth was 125.0 mL/(volatile solid) VS g, 115.3 mL/VS g, 109.7 mL/VS g, and 80.0 mL/VS g, respectively, and the potential of methane transformation production of broth ranks as: SB> L> SP> CS. Daily methane producing rate of SB, SP, and L broth are faster than that of CS. It is necessary to separate the corn stalks into different parts to ferment because the optimal fermentation concentrations for the different parts are different. Additionally, the Gompertz equation was also adopted to simulate the anaerobic digestion process of different materials. The Gompertz equation fitting parameters show that the biodegradation (from easy to difficult) was: L < SP < SB < CS.

Keywords:

• Anaerobic fermentation
• Biogas
• Corn stalks
• Stem pith
• Stem bark
• Leaves

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest, Ministry of Agriculture, China (No. 201403019-1) and the Joint Funds of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. U1204523).