Page 288 - Materials Chemistry, Second Edition

Life Cycle Analysis of Anaerobic Digestion of Wastewater Treatment Plants
Life Cycle Assessment of Wastewater Treatment

13 Life Cycle Analysis of

Anaerobic Digestion

of Wastewater

Treatment Plants

Rosalía Rodríguez, Juan José Espada,
Raúl Molina, and Daniel Puyol

CONTENTS
13.1 Introduction ..................................................................................................269
13.1.1 AD as a Key in Circular Economy of Wastewater Management .....269
13.1.2 Conventional Application of AD ...................................................... 271
13.1.3 Novel Concepts in Anaerobic Digestion ...........................................273
13.2 Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of Anaerobic Digestion of Urban and
Industrial Wastewater Treatment ..................................................................277
13.2.1 LCA of Anaerobic Digestion of Urban Wastewater Treatment ........279
13.2.2 LCA of Anaerobic Digestion of Industrial Wastewater Treatment ......281
13.3 Anaerobic Digestion of Wastewater Sludge (ADWWS) ...............................284
13.3.1 LCA Modeling of Wastewater Sludge Management Systems ..........285
13.3.2 Application of LCA to Anaerobic Digestion of
Wastewater Sludge (ADWWS) .........................................................286
References ..............................................................................................................290

13.1 INTRODUCTION

13.1.1 AD As A Key in CirCulAr eConomy of WAsteWAter mAnAgement
Anaerobic digestion (AD) is a highly mature technology. The conversion of particu-
lates and soluble organic components from waste and wastewater into methane has
been approached from the 19th century (Abbasi et al., 2012). Originally, AD was used
for the stabilization of manure and human excreta solids, but was then largely applied
to treat biomass solid waste from biological processes for domestic wastewater treat-
ment until the 1970s. The energy recovery concept by AD was not included until the
early 1970s, which was concurrent with the economic crisis caused by the rise of
fossil fuel prices, and was the starting point to consider AD as a feasible technology
to convert residual waste or energy crops into bioenergy (as biogas or biohydrogen).
The energy balance is therefore a key step to address sustainable biogas production

269