Effects of Oxidative Treatments on Biomethane Potential of Solid Olive Residues

As energy systems transition toward renewable resources, anaerobic digestion (AD) is actually receiving growing attention. AD relies on biochemical methane potential (BMP) tests to determine the methane potential of by-products of carbonious nature. This investigation aims to understand how an oxidative treatment, like the Fenton reaction, influences the BMP, starting from solid residues of olive oil production, coming from the two-phase extraction systems (TPES). We compared two different olive pomaces (with and without stones), both from TPES. The Fenton treatment here proposed is able to produce three effects in the employed matrices: improving the speed of BMP decreasing the bacteriostatic effect of phenols, reducing the H2S content in the produced biogas (precipitating it as FeS) and enhancing the production of methane in the first four weeks of the test.