Impact of nickel nanoparticles on biogas production from cattle manure

The presence of nano-nutrients can be stimulatory for the anaerobic digestion (AD) of hardly degradable wastes and thus enhance process performance. One of the essential trace elements, nickel (Ni), is involved in multiple important enzymes necessary for efficient AD. This study investigated the effects of Ni nanoparticles (NPs) with different concentrations on cattle manure AD performance and effluent chemical composition. The results showed that the highest specific biogas production was attained with 4 mg/L Ni NPs ( p <0.05) and was 792.00 mL/g VS compared with cattle manure-only which yielded only 589.20 mL/g VS. Moreover, the addition of 2 mg/L Ni NPs significantly increases the methane yield ( p <0.05) by 70.46% compared with cattle manure-only. Besides, H 2 S production decreased by 16.50%, 90.47%, and 51.89% compared with cattle manure-only when the cattle manure was treated by 1, 2, and 4 mg/L Ni NPs, respectively. The supplementation of bio-digester with 2 mg/L Ni NPs improved the total and volatile solids removal efficiencies by 19.2% and 12.1% and maintained pH at a suitable level (6.8–7.3). FTIR spectrum of effluent presented the addition of Ni NPs changed the intensity and shift of peaks compared with cattle manure-only peak. Moreover, all of the effluent samples from the AD systems using Ni NPs showed stronger fertilizer values, as well as the effluent with 2 mg/L Ni NPs, had the highest sulfide content (31.2%, increase), leading to higher H 2 S removal efficiency by 47.5%. A first-order kinetic model showed an increase up to 1.88-fold in the hydrolysis rate constant ( K ), in 4mg/L Ni NPs compared to cattle manure-only, leading to higher biogas yield.