Hydrothermal carbonisation of sewage sludge and resulting biofuels as a sustainable energy source

Nina Kossińska, Renata Krzyżyńska, Heba Ghazal and Hussam Jouhara

Energy, 2023, vol. 275, issue C

Abstract: Sewage sludge is nowadays a permanent element of our lives. One promising idea is to turn these wastes into fuels. Special scientific attention is given to the possibility of applying the low temperature thermochemical method commonly referred to as hydrothermal carbonisation (HTC) in the context of sewage sludge (SS) utilisation. While many scientist suggest the use of HTC products in agriculture, this review focuses on the energetic use of HTC products as solid fuels and co-substrates in the anaerobic digestion (AD) process of a biogas plant. HTC is a very promising technology, however, a potential barrier to its implementation may be the lack of authoritative data on long-term economic and environmental benefits and the legal restrictions associated with the further use of the products. In addition, incomplete knowledge in the field of subcritical water effects on the complex and irregular structure of SS may not provide a guarantee for the appropriate application of this method. This article attempts to systematise the information, insights and research deficiencies related to the HTC process of various forms of sludge towards the energetic possibilities of using the products obtained.

Keywords: Hydrochars; Wet pyrolysis; Renewable energy sources; Anaerobic Digestion; HTC (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544223007314
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:275:y:2023:i:c:s0360544223007314

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2023.127337

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().