Assessment of anaerobic digestion of biobased packaging material
Albini, Manuel Albini (2020)
Albini, Manuel Albini
2020
Tekniikan ja luonnontieteiden tiedekunta - Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2020-11-12
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202011057833
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202011057833
Tiivistelmä
The environmental pollution related to the production and waste management of conventional plastics have led the packaging industries to search for bio alternatives. An alternative to petroleum-based plastics are the bioplastics. Bioplastics can biodegrade under conditions existing in natural environment. One of these conditions is the anaerobic environment. Which is based on the organic recycling, one of the end-of-life options for the waste management of bioplastics. This current research investigated the anaerobic biodegradation of seven different commercially available biomaterials, and two non-biodegradable plastics which were used as control. The study was carried out in different times using two different set-ups. The anaerobic biodegradation was also performed in the presence and absence of kitchen waste to simulate the situation where discarded food packages are often contaminated with food waste. The biochemical methane potential batch test allowed the estimation of the conversion of carbon into gaseous products. There was no evidence that any of the biomaterials inhibited the anaerobic digestion process. It was concluded that, of the seven tested biomaterials, only three plant-based material showed substantial biodegradation under anaerobic conditions. The two compostable material studied here showed a smaller rate of biodegradation under mesophilic condition and an apparent conversion into methane.