Anaerobic digestion of Arthrospira platensis in batch mode

Anaerobic digestion is a biochemical bioprocess for the production of renewable energy. In this research, anaerobic digestion has been applied to a crude microalgal biomass: Arthrospira platensis and a lipid-extracted Arthrospira platensis to study the NH3 and H2S inhibition. To evaluate the anaerobic biodegradability of this crude microalgae and lipid extracted microalgae, a test known as biochemical methane potential (BMP) has been carried out. In order to improve the C/N ratio, a co-digestion with a rich carbon substrate is proposed. The spent coffee grounds has been chosen because its availability in the lab and its high total organic carbon concentration (47.34%). The characteristics of the studied substrates are shown in Table 1. Différent mixtures were performed in triplicate using 0.5L glass bottles with a working volume of 0.3L. Biogas production from anaerobic biomass was established by blank assays, where no substrate was provided. The BMP value was expressed as biomethane volume per mass of volatile solid (mL CH4/g VS). The biogas composition was determined by gas chromatography coupled to two thermal conductivity detector.