Potential odour emission measurement in organic fraction of municipal solid waste during anaerobic digestion: Relationship with process and biological stability parameters

V Orzi; E Cadena; G D'Imporzano; A Artola; E Davoli; M Crivelli; F Adani

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2010.04.098

Potential odour emission measurement in organic fraction of municipal solid waste during anaerobic digestion: Relationship with process and biological stability parameters

Bioresour Technol. 2010 Oct;101(19):7330-7337. doi: 10.1016/j.biortech.2010.04.098. Epub 2010 May 23.

Authors

V Orzi¹, E Cadena, G D'Imporzano, A Artola, E Davoli, M Crivelli, F Adani

Affiliation

¹ RICICLA Group - Dipartimento di Produzione Vegetale, Università degli Studi di Milano, Via Celoria 2, 20133 Milano, Italy.

PMID: 20576563
DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2010.04.098

Abstract

The aim of the present study is to investigate the correlation between microbial activity, i.e., biological stability measured by aerobic (OD(20) test) and anaerobic tests (ABP test), and odour emissions of organic fraction of municipal solid waste during anaerobic digestion in a full-scale treatment plant considering the three stages of the process (input, digested and post-digested waste). The results obtained indicated that the stabilization of the treated material reduces the odour impact measured by the olfactometric approach. Successive application of gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and electronic nose (EN) allowed the characterization of the different groups of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) responsible of odour impacts determining, also, their concentration. Principal component and partial least squares analyses applied to the EN and GC-MS data sets gave good regression for the OD(20) vs the EN and OD(20) vs the GC-MS data. Therefore, OD(20) reduction could be used as an odour depletion indicator.