Acceleration of Composting by Addition of Clinker to Tea Leaf Compost

Nobuki Morita, Yo Toma and Hideto Ueno ()
Additional contact information
Nobuki Morita: Kochi Prefectural Agricultural Research Center, 1100 Hataeda, Nankoku 783-0023, Japan
Yo Toma: Research Faculty of Agriculture, Hokkaido University, Kita-9, Nishi-9, Kita-ku, Sapporo 060-8589, Japan
Hideto Ueno: Graduate School of Agriculture, Ehime University, 3-5-7 Tarumi, Matsuyama 790-8566, Japan

Waste, 2024, vol. 2, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: The disposal of tea leaves discarded in the tea beverage market and clinker from coal-fired power plants has an impact on the environment; however, there are no reported cases of their combination for composting. Therefore, this study evaluated the effect of adding clinker from a coal-fired power plant to compost based on tea leaves, an organic waste product, on the composting rate and quality. The tea leaves-only compost was designated as Clinker 0%, and composts with 20% ( w / w ), 40% ( w / w ), and 60% ( w / w ) tea leaves supplemented with clinker were designated as Clinker 20, 40, and 60%, respectively. Each mixed material was placed in a 35 L polypropylene container with a lid and allowed to compost for 95 days. The composting rate was evaluated by the chemical oxygen demand (COD) in hot water extract and plant tests using juvenile komatsuna ( Brassica rapa var. perviridis ). The addition of clinker reduced the COD at the beginning of composting by 52.0, 74.3, and 86.7% in Clinker 20, 40, and 60%, respectively, compared to Clinker 0%. Furthermore, root elongation one month after composting was inhibited by Clinker 0% (60.1% relative to distilled water), but not by the addition of clinker (91.7–102.7% relative to distilled water). This suggests that the addition of clinker to tea leaf compost may accelerate composting.

Keywords: composting rate; chemical oxygen demand; root elongation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q16 Q18 Q2 Q20 Q23 Q24 Q25 Q28 Q3 Q31 Q38 Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2813-0391/2/1/4/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2813-0391/2/1/4/ (text/html)

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:gam:jwaste:v:2:y:2024:i:1:p:4-84:d:1331084

Access Statistics for this article

Waste is currently edited by Mr. Sumail Li

More articles in Waste from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().