Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432

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Biomass and Bioenergy

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/biombioe

Research paper

Microalgae cultivation using biogas and digestate carbon sources T

a b,c,d,∗ c,d
Mai-Linh Thi Nguyen , Chiu-Yue Lin , Chyi-How Lay
a
Faculty of Environment and Labor Safety, Ton Duc Thang University, HoChiMinh City, Viet Nam
b
Department of Environmental Engineering and Science, Feng Chia University, Taiwan
c
Green Energy and Biotechnology Industry Research Center, Feng Chia University, Taiwan
d
Master Program of Green Energy Science and Technology, Feng Chia University, Taiwan

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Anaerobic digestion produces biogas and digestate containing CO2 and volatile fatty acids, respectively that
Algae cultivation might need to be removed if they are to be used or discharged. Algae cultivation would remove the carbon in
Anaerobic digestion biogas and digestate. The present work used a textile desizing wastewater digester's biogas and digestate effluent
Biogas to cultivate microalgae Scenedesmus sp. The tested biogas CO2 and digestate chemical oxygen demand (COD)
CO2 fixation
concentrations were 22% and 3–7 g L−1, respectively. It is shown that Scenedesmus sp. could simultaneously
Digestate
Textile desizing wastewater
assimilate biogas CO2 and organic carbon in the digestate. A digestate concentration of 5 g COD L−1 resulted in
peak algal biomass concentration, COD removal and bio-CO2 fixation efficiency with values of 1.79 g L−1, 69.1%
and 98.2%, respectively in 10 day algae cultivation. Based on the experimental results, a diagram was proposed
to show a wastewater treatment to give an algae and methane bioenergy production concept as an example of
circular economy.

1. Introduction cost reductions [14–16], (2) microalgal biomass production enhance-

Anaerobic processes such as anaerobic digestion (AD) are well used
in treating high strength organic wastewaters or wastes. AD is able to
obtain some benefits such as producing biogas (mainly methane), bio-
hydrogen and biohythane as renewable energy resources [1–3] and the
digestate (AD effluent) as a bio-fertilizer or being converted into heat by
a thermal process [4–7]. In field applications, biogas and digestate are
generally utilized separately. For the biogas, to enhance the gas quality
for further combustion applications or to reduce CO2 emission pro-
blems, several technologies such as absorption, adsorption and mem-
brane separation have been applied to capture and storage CO2. How-
ever, regarding the environmental sustainability, these methodologies
are used as temporal solutions [8]. On the other hand, the digester
effluent containing high levels of inorganic and organic matters should
be treated or reutilized before its discharge. Some digestate treatment
methods such as membrane separation and evaporation can efficiently
gather the organic matters, but they require high energy [5,7]. It is
attractive if both biogas CO2 (bio-CO2) and digestate could be utilized
simultaneously in a sustainable way.
Microalgae is a high-value biomass that can be converted into bio-
chemicals and biofuels [9–11] and its growth needs some nutrients and
CO2 [12,13]. Microalgae species such as Chlorella and Scenedesmus have
been used to investigate (1) algae cultivation in the digester effluent for
ments [17,18], (3) nitrogen removal efficiency [19], and (4) the fixa-
tion efficiency of bio-CO2 from a dark-photo fermenter [17]. There
were some studies focusing on algae cultivation in digestate but little in
simultaneously-using biogas and digestate carbon sources [16,20–22].
Since CO2 enhances algae growth and biogas always contains CO2 (bio-
CO2), biogas is, therefore, a good carbon source for algae cultivation.
Such kind of using a wastewater effluent for producing algal biomass
for further utilization is a good example of circular economy concepts.
Based on the above observations, this work aims to evaluate the
feasibility of cultivating microalgae via simultaneously-using the AD-
related carbon sources: AD digestate liquid and biogas CO2. The di-
gestate concentration effects on algal biomass production and bio-CO2
fixation efficiency of algae were elucidated.
2. Materials and methods
Two series of experiments were conducted to elucidate the growth
of microalgae on two carbon sources obtained from an anaerobic di-
gester: Series I, effects of biogas CO2 via a batch algae cultivation in a
BBM medium (section 2.3); and Series II, algal biomass production
using biogas CO2 and digestate medium via a continuously-feeding
algae cultivation (section 2.4).

∗
Corresponding author. Department of Environmental Engineering and Science, Feng Chia University, Taiwan.
E-mail address: cylin@fcu.edu.tw (C.-Y. Lin).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biombioe.2019.01.050
Received 7 August 2018; Received in revised form 30 December 2018; Accepted 31 January 2019
0961-9534/ © 2019 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
M.-L. Thi Nguyen, et al.
Fig. 1. Microalgae cultivation in a photo-bioreactor (PBR) continuously-fed on biogas and digestate.
2.1. Seed microalgae
Microalgae Scenedesmus sp. was used as the seed algae in this work.
Scenedesmus sp. is ubiquitous organism commonly found in fresh water
lakes [23] and is a green microalga having characteristics of high total
lipid content, strong tolerance to high organic concentration (up to
100 g glucose L−1) and extensive growth pH range (4–11) [24]. This
microalgae Scenedesmus sp. strain was isolated from the stock cultures
in a laboratory of Feng Chia University by a plating method and then
was cultivated and preserved in Bold's Basal Medium (BBM). The BBM
was sterilized using an autoclave at 121 °C for 20 min and its stock was
stored in a refrigerator (4 °C) for preparing the final medium. The BBM
composition and concentration were similar to that used by Stein [25].
The microalgae stock cultivation conditions were temperature 25–28 °C
and a light intensity of approximately 11000 Lux (illuminated by
fluorescent light) during 24 h.
2.2. Bioreactors, biogas and digestate
A CSTR (completely-stirred tank reactor) anaerobic digester
(working volume 1.5 L) (Fig. 1) was used for producing biogas and
digestate. This digester had an iron plate (with holes of 3 mm in dia-
meter) in the middle of the reactor and was fed on granular activated
carbon-pretreated desizing textile wastewater (chemical oxygen de-
mand (COD) 41.1–48.4 g L−1) and was operated at 35 ± 1 °C and pH
7.2 ± 0.2. The biogas had average CO2 concentrations of 21–23% with
methane being the rest component. The digestate had characteristics
(average, n = 5) of pH 7.3 ± 0.2, volatile suspended solids (VSS)
concentration in effluent 4.3 ± 0.6 g L−1, VSS in supernatant
0.3 ± 0.1 g L−1, COD concentration 13.0 ± 1.5 g L−1 and soluble
metabolic products concentration 8.0 ± 1.0 g COD L−1. This digestate
was diluted with a distilled water to concentrations of 3, 5, and 7 g COD
L−1 for the Scenedesmus sp. cultivation because high strength digestate
would inhibit algal growth [21].
A CSTR photo-bioreactor (PBR, Fig. 1) was used to conduct algae
cultivation experiments. The PBR had a working volume of 900 mL and
a magnetic stirrer (mixing velocity of 50 rpm) for mixing the reactor
content. Both sides of the PBR had an external light source of 11000 lux
(14 W TL5 tungsten filament lamps).
427
Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432
2.3. Experiment series I: biogas CO2 effects on the microalgae growth
The Scenedesmus sp. cultivation was in a batch mode using the BBM
medium. Three aeration conditions were tested for elucidating CO2
effects: (1) no aeration (the control), (2) aeration with air (via air pump,
approx. 0.04% of CO2) at a flow-rate of 0.0026 vvm, and (3) aeration
with bio-CO2 from the biogas (21–23% of bio-CO2) at a flow-rate of
0.0026 vvm. The algae growth monitoring parameter was dry algal
biomass concentration which was measured daily. This experiment was
carried out only once.
2.4. Experiment series II: algae growth in biogas CO2 and digestate medium
Algal biomass production using biogas CO2 and digestate as the
carbon sources is a mixotrophic growth. In the present work, this
mixotrophic growth of Scenedesmus sp. was conducted in a con-
tinuously-feeding PBR (Fig. 1). Scenedesmus sp. was used in an initial
inoculum of OD670 (optical density measured at a wave length of
670 nm) 0.5. After one day of continuous cultivation in the BBM for
microalgae adaptation, the experiments were conducted with digestate
medium concentrations of 3, 5 and 7 g COD L−1 for ten days (for each
digestate concentration) at room temperature, initial cultivation pH
7.5, agitation rate 300 rpm and hydraulic retention time (HRT) 4.5 d.
The bio-CO2 (concentration, 21–23%) was induced (from a gas bag)
continuously into the medium at an inflow rate of 0.0026 vvm. This
medium digestate was obtained from the pretreated digested effluents
which were collected from an anaerobic digester treating TDW. The
pretreatment of the digested effluents was a centrifugation for 15 min at
9000 rpm to remove non-soluble particulate solids. The supernatant
was used as the medium of Scenedesmus sp. cultivation.
Liquid samples were collected from the PBR to determine algal
biomass and COD concentrations for showing the algae growth and
digestate consumption. Bio-CO2 reduction was obtained by measuring
the bio-CO2 concentration differences between the influent and effluent
streams for showing the CO2 consumption by the algae. This experi-
ment was carried out only once for each digestate concentration. All
analyses were carried out in triplicate and their average values were
presented.
2.5. Analytical methods
Biogas composition and bio-CO2 concentration were measured daily
M.-L. Thi Nguyen, et al.
with a gas chromatograph having a thermal conductivity detector
(China Chromatograph 8700T, Taiwan). A pH meter was used to
measure the daily variation of pH values in the PBR. COD concentra-
tions were determined following the procedure of Standard Methods
[26]. The temperatures at the glass column and injection points were
145 °C and 175 °C, respectively. The carrier gas was N2 and the packing
material was FON (Shimadzu, Japan).
Quantitative analysis of Scenedesmus sp. (cells L−1) was performed
in Neubauer chamber and dry biomass concentration (g L−1) was de-
termined using a dry weight method [27]. The specific growth rate (μ,
d−1) of Scenedesmus sp. was calculated using Equation (1) [28].
lnNt − lnN0
μ=
Δt
where Nt is the population size of the end of a time interval; N0 is the
population size of the beginning of a time interval; Δt is the length of
the time interval (tt-t0).
3. Results and discussions
3.1. Growth of Scenedesmus sp. using biogas CO2 (Experiment series I)
The capability of biogas CO2 for cultivating algae was shown via
using biogas CO2 without digestate. Fig. 2 depicts the batch growths of
Scenedesmus sp. in the BBM medium under three conditions of (1) no
aeration, (2) aeration with air (via air pump, approx. 0.04% of CO2, at
0.0026 vvm) and (3) aeration with biogas CO2 (bio-CO2 concentration
21–23%, at 0.0026 vvm).
The growth pattern of the microalgae presents the “S” shape which
known as a sigmoid and could be divided into four phases: lag, ex-
ponential, stationary and senescence. Fig. 2 shows that using the BBM
medium, the lag phase duration was about two days. The exponential
phase started from day 2 to day 7 with taking about five days. Sta-
tionary phase was from day 7. The variation of the algal biomass con-
centration values shows that aerations using both air and bio-CO2 re-
sulted in rather higher algal biomass productions (0.3 g L−1 at day 8)
than that of the control (no aeration, 0.175 g L−1 at day 8) (Fig. 2).
Moreover, it is observed that both air and bio-CO2 aeration gave a same
level of algal biomass production with final biomass concentration
values of 0.32 g L−1 and 0.30 g L−1, respectively, at day 10. These facts
indicate that the biogas CO2 was suitable for growing Scenedesmus sp.
and an aeration operation would enhance the microalgae growth rate.
Fig. 2. Growth curves of Scenedesmus sp. in BBM medium under three conditions of no aeration (●), aeration by air (○) and aeration by bio-CO2 (▼).
Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432
From the view point of biogas, this biogas was up-graded [20,21]
during the algae cultivation and the growth of the algae was enhanced.
The similar effectives of bio-CO2 and air on an algae growth had also
been reported by Doušková et al. [29] who experienced that the growth
rate of microalgae consuming biogas was the same as that of growing
on a mixture of air and food-grade carbon dioxide. The biogas carbon
source of 21–23% bio-CO2 concentration at 0.0026 vvm and an HRT of
4.5 d (based on the result obtained from the exponential phase in Fig. 2)
were used in conducting the continuous operation studies.
3.2. Algal biomass production at different digestate concentrations
(Experiment series II)
(1)
In this study, the capability of digestate for cultivating algae was
tested via using various digestate concentrations with a biogas CO2
concentration of 22%. Two findings were obtained: the algal biomass
production and COD removal were dependent on digestate concentra-
tion.
3.2.1. Digestate concentration-dependent algal biomass production trends
Fig. 3 depicts the growth of Scenedesmus sp. on three digestate
concentrations during ten days continuously-feeding cultivation. Two
groups of daily variation trend in algal biomass production along with
the cultivation time were observed: (1) the BBM medium and digestate
concentration 7 g COD L−1 gave a similar trend, and (2) the digestate
concentrations 3–5 g COD L−1 gave another trend. The BBM medium
resulted in a small increment and then a small decrease in the biomass
concentrations which trend is similar to that experienced in Fig. 2. This
cultivation had a dry algal biomass concentration of 0.31 g L−1 and a
specific growth rate of 0.007 d−1. The digestate concentration of 7 g
COD L−1 gave an algae growth variation trend similar to that of the
BBM medium, which showing small increment and then small decrease
in biomass concentration during the cultivation. On the other hand, the
digestate concentrations of 3–5 g COD L−1 gave the algae growth var-
iation trends of increasing with the increased cultivation time and di-
gestate concentration. In another words, the algae growth was digestate
concentration-dependent. This fact indicates that a proper digestate
concentration (such as 3–5 g COD L−1 in the present work) would en-
hance the growth of algae but too high digestate concentration (such as
7 g COD L−1 in the present work) would inhibit the growth of algae.
Similar digestate concentration-dependent algal biomass growth results
have been reported by Xu et al. [21], who had experienced that
428
M.-L. Thi Nguyen, et al.
Fig. 3. Daily variation of Scenedesmus sp. biomass production with different digestate concentrations.
digestate concentrations of 0.4–0.8 g COD L−1 had higher algal biomass
growth rate than those of 1.2–3.2 g COD L−1.
Moreover, it is noted that the algal biomass concentration did not
increase at the digestate concentration of 7 g COD L−1 (Fig. 3). During
the experiments, after ten-day cultivation, the green color of PBR
content changed markedly with the specific growth rate becoming ne-
gative (Table 1). It might result from the fact that high concentrations
of COD and other matters in digestate medium inhibited the growth of
the algae. Another possible reason was that the pH values reached
7.3–7.0 (since day 4) which values were not suitable for a microalgae
growth [19]. Fig. 4 depicts the daily pH variations during 10-days
cultivations at different digestate concentrations. The pH values
maintained at 7.5 for the BBM reactor and reached over 7.8 (a suitable
algae growth range, [24]) for the digestate COD concentrations of 3 and
5 g L−1. The influent digestate pH was 7.5. Higher effluent pH values
(8.2 and 7.8 for the 3 and 5 g COD L−1 operations at day 10, respec-
tively; Fig. 4) indicate the consumptions of organic acids via COD re-
movals (Table 1) during the algae cultivation. Peak algal biomass
production occurred at digestate concentration 5 g COD L−1 and cor-
responded to peak COD removal of 69.1%.
3.2.2. COD removal efficiency
After ten days of algae cultivation, digestate's COD removal and
specific algae growth rate were calculated (Table 1). The CO2 removal
efficiency was calculated based on the measurement of CO2 con-
centration at the inlet and outlet of the PBR reactor. This calculation
could not use a method of CO2 capture rate that proposed by Razzaka
et al. [30] because the carbon sources included bio-CO2 gas and liquid
digestate. Table shows that peak values of biomass concentration and
specific growth rate were 1.79 g L−1 and 0.18 d−1, respectively; they
Table 1
Algal biomass concentration, COD removal, specific algae growth rate, biogas CO2 removal and methane removal in cultivating Scenedesmus sp. at various digestate
concentrations for 10 days.
Digestate concentration (g Algal biomass (g COD removal (%) Algal specific growth
COD L−1) L−1) rate (d−1)
a
3 1.41 51.6 ± 5.9 0.15
5 1.79 69.1 ± 5.3 0.18
7 0.32 2.4 ± 1.6 - 0.009
a
Mean ± Standard deviation (n = 3 samples).
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Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432
occurred at the digestate concentration of 5 g COD L−1 which had high
CO2 removal (98.2%). This algal biomass concentration value
(1.79 g L−1) is comparable to reported values of Scenedesmus sp. in
treating sewage (0.75–2 g L−1, [31]) or an artificial medium
(> 1.22 g L−1, [32]). However, the digestate concentrations of 3 and
7 g COD L−1 had low CO2 removals of 47.8 and 23.8%, respectively.
These results indicate that the COD removal was digestate concentra-
tion-dependent (Table 1). Peak COD removal (69.1%) corresponded to
peak algal biomass production at 5 g COD L−1 digestate concentration.
Since biogas CO2 and digestate were used as the carbon sources, the
removal of digestate COD is another indicator showing the up-grading
efficiencies of this system for reducing an effluent pollutant strength.
Table 1 shows that peak COD removal rate 69.1% occurred also at the
digestate concentration of 5 g COD L−1 which had peak CO2 removal
(98.2%). Because in the present study, there was no any heating or
sterilizing pretreatments for the digestate, it is noted that the COD re-
movals might include the functions of algal and bacterial growths.
However, this COD removal value is comparable to some reported va-
lues by Xu et al. [21] and Wang et al. [22] (Table 2). Xu et al. [21]
reported that an algae cultivation in a digestate concentration of 3.2 g
COD L−1 had COD removals of 61.6–75.3%. Wang et al. [22] reported
that a S. obliquus cultivation in a digestate concentration of 993 mg COD
L−1 had COD removals of 71.8–75.7%. Moreover, though the COD
removal efficiency of the present work is comparable to those of these
two works, the present work shows that an algae cultivation at higher
digestate concentration (5 g COD L−1 vs. 0.99–3.2 g COD L−1, Table 2)
was available. High digestate concentration implies low dilution re-
quirement, which is favorable in practical application.
Biogas CO2 (%) Biogas CH4 (%)
Influent Effluent Removal Influent Effluent Removal
23 ± 3.4 12 ± 2.3 47.8 ± 5.3 69.8 ± 2.8 60.4 ± 4.8 13.5
22 ± 4.7 0.4 ± 0.1 98.2 ± 10.1 70.1 ± 8.2 66.3 ± 5.1 5.4
21 ± 2.1 16 ± 1.1 23.8 ± 6.7 65.2 ± 7.1 60.8 ± 11.3 6.7
M.-L. Thi Nguyen, et al. Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432

Fig. 4. Daily variations of pH at various digestate concentrations during a 10-days algae cultivation in the PBR.

Table 2 and medium composition, with the first two factors being inter-related
Comparisons of experimental results on this study with references. [35].
Carbon Sources Algal Biomass Digestate Biogas References
Productivity (g COD CO2 3.4. Significances of the experimental results
Digestate Biogas (%) L−1 d−1) Removal Removal
COD (g L- (%) (%)
3.4.1. Bacterial growth problems using raw digestate
1)
In the present study, the collected TDW digestate was used as the
– 2–12 0.14–1.21 – 13.6–58.0 [32] substrate for algae cultivation without any pretreatments such as auto-
0.4–3.2 37 0.12–0.31 62–75 54–74 [21] clave or pasteurization to inactivate the indigenous bacteria. Therefore,
0.98 29.6 0.387a 61–70 79.4–85 [22] it was possible to have bacterial growths during the algal cultivations
3–7 22.1 −0.009–0.18 2.4–69.1 23.8–98.2 This study
5b 22.1 0.18 69.1 98.2 This study
and this fact might affect the calculated results of dry algal biomass and
the COD removal efficiency of the microalgae (Fig. 3 and Tables 1 and
a
Algal specific growth rate. 2). The facts of bacterial growths during the algal cultivations are well
b
Value resulted in peak algal biomass production. experienced in using wastewater substrates [34,36]. Moreover, because
there was no separation treatments on algal and bacterial biomasses
3.3. CO2 fixation and biogas purification by Scenedesmus sp. during measuring the algal biomass, the dry algal biomass would con-
tain a bacterial biomass. However, the bacterial biomass concentrations
During the cultivations of algae on biogas CO2 or biogas CO2 with might not be high because the digestate would contain anaerobic bac-
digestate medium, CO2 would be used as the carbon source. From the teria which might not grow well in the aerobic PBR algae bioreactor
view point of biogas component, the biogas quality was up-graded during the 10-days cultivation. In practical applications, to prevent the
because of the reduction of CO2 component. In this case, biogas CO2 algal biomass measurement errors caused from bacterial growths in
was removed and fixed in algal biomass (biological fixation). In this using digestate substrates, it is suggested to directly determine the
study, only one flow rate (0.0026 vvm) of biogas CO2 was used for the chlorophyll concentrations [36] instead of using biomass weight
experiments and the inflow and outflow gas concentrations were method.
measured daily. The concentration variation results of the raw and
purified biogases that based on biogas CO2 and CH4 concentrations are 3.4.2. Capability of using bio-CO2 and digestate
summarized in Table 1. For the tested biogas CO2 concentrations As shown in Fig. 2, bio-CO2 had only a 10% increment than air CO2
(21–23%), CO2 removal efficiencies (ranged from 23.8% to 98.2%) in enhancing algal growth. From the view point of engineering, using
were markedly dependent on the digestate concentrations with peak this bio-CO2 might not be an efficient or cost-effective way for culti-
biogas CO2 removal efficiency (98.2%) being found at 5 g COD L−1 of vating algae compared with using air aeration. However, using bio-CO2
digestate medium. This high removal efficiency is higher than reported for algae cultivation would reduce CO2 emission and present an op-
values (Table 2) of 54–74% in a digestate concentration of 3.2 g COD portunity to increase the reduction of carbon footprint in operating an
L−1 [21] and values of 13.6–58.0% for Chlorella sp. and Scenedesmus sp anaerobic digester [37,38]. Moreover, microalgae cultivation on di-
[33]. However, all increase in CO2 removal efficiency from 47.8% (at gestate has the advantages of utilizing carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus,
3 g L−1) to 98.2% (at 5 g L−1) could not explain the slight increase in and other nutrients in digestate, enhancing microalgae growth, as well
algal growth. There might have some effects from a bacterial growth in as reducing cultivation costs and environmental impacts [15].
the system because of using raw digestate [34]. In the present study, the achievements of algal biomass production
High CO2 removal indicates the achievement of highly up-graded and COD removal indicate the feasibility of cultivating microalgae in a
biogas. However, during the algae cultivation, it was observed that TDW digestate effluent. The experiments of cultivating Scenedesmus sp.
biogas CH4 concentrations decreased slightly (6.7–13.5%, Table 1). The focused only on the algal biomass production and the removals of COD
reduction of CH4 concentration might result from the consumption of and CO2; no other water quality parameters such as volatile fatty acids,
CH4 by methanogenic bacteria contained in the digestate [19]. It has VSS, total nitrogen and total phosphorus concentrations were discussed.
been reported that biological fixation of CO2 highly depends on oper- However, the TDW contained less components such as nitrogen and
ating conditions such as CO2 loading, pH, temperature, light intensity phosphor that are helpful in growing algae. Therefore, if other

430
M.-L. Thi Nguyen, et al.
Fig. 5. A proposed diagram of textile desizing wastewater (TDW) treatment to generate bioenergy material and source as an example of a circular economy.
wastewaters rich in nitrogen and phosphor are mixed and used as the
substrate would enhance the algal biomass production [12,19,39].
Using different wastewaters having complementary characteristics in
treating wastewaters would reduce the treatment requirements and
meet a concept of cradle-to-cradle in circular economy.
Other than adding proper nitrogen and phosphor concentrations,
there are some strategies such as controlling illumination intensity
[20], CO2 concentration [23], CO2 flow-rate and digestate concentra-
tion [21] could be applied to enhance algal biomass production. In the
present work, the biological fixation of CO2 was tested only at one
biogas concentration value (21–23% bio-CO2) giving an algal biomass
concentration of 0.30 g L−1. It was because the digester biogas con-
centrations were in this range values (22%). However, in practical
application this bio-CO2 concentration might need to be diluted be-
cause 10–15% CO2 were reported to have best growth potentials for
Scenedesmus sp [23,32]. Moreover, the microalgae cultivation using
digestate effluent without sterilization would face numerous problems
including bacterial contamination and microorganisms’ competition.
Further researches are needed with testing more parameters such as pH
control, various bio-CO2 flow-rate values [13], long term operation
(algae cultivation longer than ten days) and even turbidity effects [15].
3.4.3. Industrial wastewater-related circular economy
As mentioned in the section “Introduction”, algal biomass is a good
feedstock for producing biofuels or valuable chemicals. The effectives of
algae cultivation on digestate might include the promotion of algae
quality such as increasing lipid and carotenoid concentrations [16]. In
the present work, the algae cultivation had CO2 removal rates of
47.8–98.2%, indicating that the biogas was up-graded with having high
methane concentration. Though a small part (7–8%, in the present
study) of methane in the biogas might be reduced during the up-grading
operation, this up-graded biogas is suitable for being used as a natural
gas. Based on these observations, a diagram showing a TDW treatment
to give algal biomass and methane bioenergy production concept as an
example of industrial wastewater-related circular economy is proposed
(Fig. 5). In this circular economy concept, a TDW is anaerobically di-
gested to produce methane as biofuel and its digestate and biogas CO2
are used to cultivate microalgae that is to be used as a feedstock for
producing biodiesel or valuable chemicals. To evaluate the feasibility of
commercializing this process, a techno-economic analysis [40] via
considering internal rate of return and payback period might be ap-
plied.
4. Conclusion
Microalgae Scenedesmus sp. is able to simultaneously assimilate
biogas CO2 and digestate effluent generated from an anaerobic digester
and its capability in algal biomass production, COD removal and bio-
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Biomass and Bioenergy 122 (2019) 426–432
CO2 fixation is comparable to reported values. In other words, biogas
up-grading and digestate pollutant reduction could be simultaneously
achieved. However, a proper control of digestate concentration is ne-
cessary to efficiently enhance but not to inhibit the growth of algae. A
digestate concentration of 5 g COD L−1 resulted in peak algal biomass
concentration, COD removal and biogas CO2 fixation efficiency with
values of 1.79 g L−1, 69.1%, and 98.2%, respectively.
Acknowledgements
This research was funded by Ministry of Science and Technology of
Taiwan (MOST 104-2221-E-035 -006 -MY3).
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