In the coming weeks, the Italian demo-site will see the completion of the installation of the ozonolysis plant and all its components, including the tank for liquid oxygen, which, converted into ozone, will treat the sludge entering the digester, thus increasing the production of biomethane and reducing the waste produced by the facility.
At the same time, the design of the area that will host the biological upgrading pilot plant, capable of generating additional biomethane from the union of hydrogen with residual CO2, and the codigestion pilot plant is continuing. The management of the safety aspects of the installation area and the ATEX safety certifications is underway, especially with regards to the use of gases such as hydrogen, methane and oxygen.
In the meantime, important experimental results have come from the laboratory of the Politecnico di Milano where inoculum and bacterial growth tests are being carried out on the membrane selected for EBM (Ex-situ Biological Methanation): the efficiencies, growth and transfer rates result to be very positive, generating confidence on the results obtainable on the upgrading pilot which, after a period of a few months of fine-tuning at the laboratories of the Politecnico, will be transferred to the pilots’ area of the Bresso wastewater treatment plant.
