Drying of Food Waste for Potential Use as Animal Feed

Abdul Wasim Noori, Mohammad Jafar Royen, Alžbeta Medveďová and Juma Haydary
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Abdul Wasim Noori: Institute of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Radlinského 9, 81237 Bratislava, Slovakia
Mohammad Jafar Royen: Institute of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Radlinského 9, 81237 Bratislava, Slovakia
Alžbeta Medveďová: Institute of Food and Nutrition, Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Radlinského 9, 81237 Bratislava, Slovakia
Juma Haydary: Institute of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Radlinského 9, 81237 Bratislava, Slovakia

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 10, 1-19

Abstract: A considerable part of food is wasted, causing investment capital loss as well as environmental pollution and health problems in humans. Indirect solar drying was applied to test the potential of drying and reusing this waste as a component of animal feed. The effect of weather changes on drying kinetics and the effective diffusion coefficient, dried feed nutritional composition, and microbiological analysis of the dried product were investigated. A convective laboratory dryer was used as a reference method. Weather conditions have a crucial effect on the use of solar drying; one sunny day with appropriate conditions can reduce the water activity of food waste to below 0.3 and moisture content to below 6%. Much better fitting of experimental and model drying curves was achieved considering sample shrinkage, applying a more complex solution of Fick’s second law combined with an optimization procedure. The studied food waste had a good combination of nutrients, such as protein, fat, and carbohydrates; however, the amount of protein in the dried food waste was found to be lower than that in regular feed, and therefore, adding a protein source is recommended. Autoclaving of fresh samples reduced the total microbial counts of dried samples by more than 50%.

Keywords: food waste; pre-treatment; solar drying; convective drying; effective diffusion coefficient (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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