Sustainable production of bio-crude oil via hydrothermal liquefaction of symbiotically grown biomass of microalgae-bacteria coupled with effective wastewater treatment

Sci Rep. 2019 Oct 18;9(1):15016. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-51315-5.

Abstract

The study demonstrates a sustainable process for production of bio-crude oil via hydrothermal liquefaction of microbial biomass generated through co-cultivation of microalgae and bacteria coupled with wastewater remediation. Biomass concentration and wastewater treatment efficiency of a tertiary consortium (two microalgae and two bacteria) was evaluated on four different wastewater samples. Total biomass concentration, total nitrogen and COD removal efficiency was found to be 3.17 g L-1, 99.95% and 95.16% respectively when consortium was grown using paper industry wastewater in a photobioreactor under batch mode. Biomass concentration was enhanced to 4.1 g L-1 through intermittent feeding of nitrogen source and phosphate. GC-MS and FTIR analysis of bio-crude oil indicates abundance of the hydrocarbon fraction and in turn, better oil quality. Maximum distillate fraction of 30.62% lies within the boiling point range of 200-300 °C depicting suitability of the bio-crude oil for conversion into diesel oil, jet fuel and fuel for stoves.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Bacteria / growth & development*
  • Biofuels / analysis*
  • Biomass*
  • Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry
  • Microalgae / growth & development*
  • Nitrogen
  • Photobioreactors
  • Symbiosis / physiology*
  • Temperature
  • Thermogravimetry
  • Wastewater / analysis

Substances

  • Biofuels
  • Waste Water
  • Nitrogen