Monitoring of total concentrations of copper, iron and manganese in the anaer-obic digestion of molasses

Abstract

Nowadays, where the use of fossil fuels and the excessive emission of greenhouse gases directly affect the quality of the environment, the search for sustainable alternative sources that meet the increase of the world energy demand is indispensable. In this scenario, one solution is the use of wastewater for bioenergy production, through biorefineries that, through anaerobic biological processes, digest the organic matter present in the wastewater and generate biogas. Biogas production or process efficiency can be influenced by the amount of trace elements present in the wastewater.  The objective of this work was to monitor the total concentrations of copper, iron and manganese trace elements in the anaerobic digestion of molasses to try to establish the influence of the metals on the biogas production from the treatment of molasses, in order to obtain a maximization of the energy production in the form of biogas, being of great importance and applicability to minimize environmental impacts. For molasses, a correlation of influence was not observed for the analyzed concentration ranges of copper (36.78 to 449.38 µg.L^-1), iron (154.61 to 2160.31µg.L^-1) and manganese (25,79 to 391,83 µg.L^-1), because these ranges did not affect the performance of the bioreactor.