Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.

12 - 13 October 2010

Design of Biogas Plant from Fruit Market Waste in

Indonesia

Khamdan Cahyari
1
, Ryan Anugrah Putra
2


1
Chemical Engineering Dept., Islamic University of Indonesia, Indonesia
2
School of Engineering, University of Bors, 50 190 Bors, Sweden
1
Coresspondence: cahyari.khamdan@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT:

Design of biogas plant utilizing fruit market waste as raw material was carried out. The
plant is aimed to process 4 tones/day of generated waste from trading activities in Gemah
Ripah fruit market, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. The waste contains 80% rotten fruits itself with
the rest 20% consist of rice straw, leaves, wood, fabrics and plastic. Sorting waste at source is
expected to be conducted so that fabrics and plastic are no longer mixed up in the waste.
Further, it will contains 86% moisture, 12% volatile solid (VS) and 1% inorganic materials.
The biogas production follows mesophilic anaerobic digestion (AD) at temperature 35C, pH
7.0-7.5 and the theoretical biogas yield is 0.686 Nm
3
/kg VS so that with an assumption 80%
biodegradability, total biogas is 300 Nm
3
/day with 50% 0.65 methane (CH
4
). Then biogas is
combusted in generator (30% eff.) produces 494 kWh electricity/day or 0.16 GWh/annum (330
working days per year). In addition total residual sludge is 2.9 tons/day consisting of 0.1 tons
potential organic fertilizer (compost) as well as worm (as birds feed) and 2.8 m
3
of water
irrigation.
Biogas plant consists of crushing equipment, mixing tank, pumping system, digester,
generator, centrifuge, and vermin-composting area. It starts with transportation of organic
waste to biogas plant will be carried out manually using carts. Crushing process consumes
power up to 2.2 kW with capacity 2.0 tons/hour. Volume of mixing tank is 8 m
3
. The
bioreactor is a cylindrical vertical tank with total volume is about 200 m
3
. The generator is
used to convert biogas into electricity (output 30 kW, 220 V). Further, dewatering system unit
runs on 2 tons sludge/h consuming 67 kWh/day electricity. Vermi-composting system is
conducted through windrow system occupied 16 m
2
areas.

Keywords: fruit market waste, biogas, electricity, organic fertilizer, Indonesia


NOMENCLATURES

AD Anaerobic Digestion
CH
4
Methane
CO
2
Carbon dioxide
H
2
S Hydrogen Sulfide
TS Total Solid (mg.l
-1
)
VS Volatile Solid (mg.l
-1
)
OLR Organic Loading Rate (kg.m
-3
.d
-1
)
LCA Life Cycle Assessment
BMP Bio Methane Potential (m
3
.kg
-1
)
FVW Fruit and Vegetable Waste
COD Chemical Oxygen Demand (mg.l
-1
)
HRT Hydraulic Retention Time (d)
m.o microorganisms
STP Standard Temperature (0C) &
Pressure (1 bar)
Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

1. INTRODUCTION

Fruit is one of the important trading
commodities through out the globe. Food and
Agricultural Organization of United Nation
(FAO UN) reported that world fruit
production in 2008 was more than 570
millions tones in which 2.6% was from
Indonesia
*
. In addition, Center of Statistics
Bureau of Indonesia reported that it tends to
rise annually as consequence of the increasing
numbers of human population in Indonesia

.
In order to supply the demand, official
government and/or private organization
establish fruit markets through out Indonesia
in different sizes and places. Gemah Ripah
fruit market is one of those markets which
serve most of fruit demand in the region of
Yogyakarta Province. It is located in
Gamping district, Sleman regency,
Yogyakarta. Since local production of fruit is
not enough, the market imports some fruit
from East Java, Sulawesi, Kalimantan, Bali as
well as other countries such as US, China,
Brazil, Argentina, and Thailand. Board of the
market reported that total volume of incoming
fruit varies according to the seasonal fruit in
the range of 2 to 11 tones/day. Further, part of
fruit becomes unsalable because of
deterioration accordingly turning into waste
in a volume between 4 to 10 tones/day [1].
Composition of the waste was reported
that it contains 80% of rotten fruits and the
rest 20% comprises of rice straw, leaves,
wood, fabrics and plastic. Orange, mango and
apple constitutes as three top components in
the waste with percentage as 65%, 25% and
5% respectively. Other fruits comply the rest
5% comprising of different type of fruits such
as pineapple, watermelon, melon, grape,
zalacca, avocado, longan, starfruit, rambutan,
papaya, the rose-apple, guava, and
mangosteen [1-2].
Open-dumping of the waste is preferred
as solution to avoid uncomfortable condition
in the market. It is carried out through

*
FAOSTATUN(2010)

BPSIndonesia(2010)
transporting those waste using trucks and
delivering to nearby landfill site. This practice
constitutes severe economic and
environmental problems such as methane
emission (greenhouse gases) [3].
Deterioration of organic materials in
free-oxygen condition with the aid of
anaerobic microorganism produces biogas
consisting of mainly 50-70% methane (CH
4
),
carbon dioxide (CO
2
) and traces amount
hydrogen sulfide (H
2
S) [4-6]. It is commonly
known as anaerobic digestion. Fruit market
waste belongs to organic material has the
opportunity to adopt this method in order to
prevent any economic and environmental
problems because of open-dumping
treatment.
Bouallagui, 2003 reported that through
anaerobic digestion of FVW in mesophilic
tubular digester with HRT 20 days, one is
able to produce 452.6 liter biogas per kg VS
[7]. Some other experiments on FVW
digestion are summarized in Table 1.
The aim of this work was to evaluate
potential biogas production based on the this
fruit market waste and to design a biogas
plant as an alternative solution for Gemah
Ripah fruit market waste.

2. METHODS

2.1. Bio Methane Potential (BMP)

BMP is parameter that shows the
maximum generated biogas from particular
organic material. This value was calculated
theoretically based on chemical reaction of
anaerobic digestion. Chemical formula
(C
a
H
b
O
c
N
d
) of the waste was evaluated based
on the value of VS and composition of
carbohydrate, protein and fats in three major
fruits constituting the waste whose values
were extracted from reference [1].
Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Table 1 Previous Study on Fruit & Vegetable Waste Digestion

Raw materials Operating condition Methane Yield Ref.
FVW(fromfruitmarket)
Mesophilic,20daysHRT,tubular
digester,Feedingconcentration6%
TS
452.60l/kgVS
added
[7]
FVW(28differentfractions)
Mesophilic,30daysHRT,OLR0.3
1.3kg/kgVS/m
3
day
0.07m
3
/kgVS
added
[8] Codigestion67%FVW,17%solid
slaughterhousewaste,17%
manure
0.350.02m
3
/kg
VSadded
FVW(fromfruitmarket)
Thermophilic,20daysHRT,tubular
digester,Feedingconcentration6%
TS
603.46l/kgVS
added
[9]
FVW(fromfruitmarket)
Mesophilic,twophasesreactor,
OLR7.5gCOD/l.d
450.3L22.3/kg
CODadded
[10]
Codigestion20%FVW(9fractions)
with80%cattleslurry
Mesophilic,21daysHRT,OLR3.19
5.01kgVS/m
3
day
0.23m
3
/kgVS
added.
[11]


To evaluate the potential biogas
production based on anaerobic digestion
process of Gemah Ripah fruit market waste,
one has to understand the basic reaction
underlying the degradation of organic
materials with the help of a consortium of
microorganisms. In the absence of oxygen,
the organic materials are consumed by the
microorganisms (m.o) to grow, renew cells
along with generating predominate gases i.e.
methane (CH
4
) and carbon dioxide (CO
2
),
trace amount of hydrogen sulfide (H
2
S) as by-
product of the metabolisms. In addition,
ammonia is produced during the chemical
reaction which is dissolved in liquid phase
[12]. The reaction simply can be written as
below:
Organic matter + H
2
O + nutrients + m.o
new cells of m.o+ resistant organic matter +
CO
2
+ CH
4
+ NH
3
+ H
2
S + heat

If the degradation takes places for infinite
time which means that all organic matters
degrade, the chemical reaction is given as
follow:

C
a
B
b
0
c
N
d
+[
4a-b-2c-3d
4
B
2
0

m.o
-- [
4a+b-2c-3d
8
CB
4
+
[
4a-b+2c+3d
8
C0
2
+ uNB
3
..... (a)

BMP is calculated as total volume of methane
and carbon dioxide divided by VS value of
the waste. Furthermore, the total volume is a
multiplication of each mol of methane from
equation (a) with 22.4 liter (molar volume at
STP of ideal gas).
2.2. Process Technology Selection

An overview of waste management
concept in the market is illustrated in Fig. 1.
The fruit market waste is sorted at source by
fruit sellers into organic and inorganic
fractions. Workers pick up the organic one
using carts and deliver to biogas plant for
further process. The second fraction is
transported to landfill area.


Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Fig. 1 Integrated Waste Management of Gemah Ripah Fruit Market

Further, biogas is produced through
anaerobic digestion subsequently combusted
in generator to produce electricity for lighting
on the market and biogas plant itself. In
addition residual digestate sludge is subjected
to dewatering unit to separate solid and water
fractions. Since nearby fruit market is large
area of farming, the water is used as irrigation
while the solid one is composted first as
fertilizer to substitute chemical fertilizer
which has been used for decades in those
farming area along with efforts to reduce
dependence on highly expensive fertilizer.
Selection of sequential processes was
conducted based on the principal of adopting
low energy consumption, high efficiency
process, empowering local workers, utilizing
local raw materials and implementing the
integrated concept of waste management of
Gemah Ripah fruit market. Therefore,
equipments are designed to be manufactured
using concrete or stainless steel which is
easily found in Yogyakarta.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

3.1. Theoretical Biogas Production

Removal of fabrics and plastic through
sorting waste at source concept increases
volatile solid content of the waste. The
characteristics of waste are summarized in
Table 2. Moisture, VS, and ashes content of
fruit waste was taken as average moisture
content of constituent fruits. Since there were
lacks of data regarding the moisture, VS, and
ash contents of rice straw, leaves, wood,
approximate values were carefully taken.
Accordingly, fruit market waste contains 86%
moisture, 12% volatile solid (VS) and 1%
inorganic materials.


Fruit Market Waste
Sorting
Biogas Production
Collecting
Organic
Inorganic
Transportation
Landfill Site
Biogas
Residual
Sludge
Combustion
(Generator)
Dewatering
Fertilizer
Water
Maggot/Worm
Cutivation
wet solid materials
Composting
Saleable
Maggot/Worm
Electricit y Irrigation
Farmland
areas
Livestock Feed
(e.g. chicken, birds)
Market and/or
New Enterprises
C
u
t
i
v
a
t
i
o
n

o
f

O
r
g
a
n
i
c

F
r
u
i
t
s

&

V
e
g
e
t
a
b
l
e
s
Not e:
mass flow
utilization
Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Table 2 Characteristic of Waste after Fabrics
and Plastic Removal
N
o
Waste %
Mass
(kg/d)
Moisture
(kg/d)
VS
(kg/d)
Ash
(kg/d)
1
Fruit waste 89.0 3561.0 3206.6 354.4 23.7
2
Rice straw 7.2 290.0 145.0 116.6 27.4
3
Leaves 3.7 145.0 125.8 18.2 4.0
4
Wood 0.1 4.0 0.6 3.3 0.1
Total 100.0 4000.0 3478.0 492.5 55.2

Volatile solid of fruit waste contains
carbohydrate (C
6
H
10
O
5
), protein (C
57
H
104
O
6
)
and fats (C
5
H
7
O
2
N). Each of fruit was taken
into account in determining mass of carbon,
hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. Calculation
of mass of those four elements was conducted
through multiplying the VS with percentage
of carbohydrates, protein and fats
subsequently determining total mass of each
element. Further, it is divided by its atomic
weight resulting in mol of each element. The
chemical formula of the fruit waste is
C
13
H
22
O
10
N
0.14
with 1,000 gram VS as basis
calculation. Methane and carbon dioxide
production from this chemical substance are
easily calculated according to equation (a).
Volume of the two gases in STP condition
that can be produced from 4 tones of fruit
waste is 300 m
3
. Rice straw, leaves and wood
are also digested with yield 0.6 m
3
/kg VS
[13]. Total potential biogas from the fruit
market waste is 375 m
3
/d contains 50%
0.65 methane (CH
4
).

3.2. Process Description and Mass Balance

Process flow diagram of biogas plant is
depicted in Fig. 2. It starts with size reduction
of fruit waste into less than 2 mm in crushing
equipment whose capacity is 1 tones/hour.
Crushed fruit waste is then stored temporarily
in mixing tank with size as 2 m x 2 m x 2 m.
When pH in digester goes down, addition of
lime powder is conducted in this tank. It also
has function to sediment inorganic materials
such as sand, un-crushed wood which may be
found in fruit waste. In case of the need of
mixing in this tank, it is performed manually
by workers. Furthermore, screw pump is
utilized to feed up the crushed fruit waste to
digester.
Digester is the main equipment in biogas
plant. It is bioreactor in which fruit market
waste is biologically degraded with the aid of
anaerobic microorganism and transformed
into biogas & residual digestate sludge. The
process operates on optimum condition that is
1 bar and 35C,pH 7.0-7.5, 3 kg VS.m
-3
.d
-1

and 42 days of HRT.
Biogas is then channeled to generator for
combustion process and transforming into
electricity. There is no purification process
for the biogas based on the fact that fruit
contains limited amount of protein which
consequently resulting traces amount of
hydrogen sulfide (H
2
S).
Since there is limitation of fruit
biodegradability, the process produces side-
product which commonly called as residual
sludge mainly consisting of water and
residual solid materials. Therefore, it then is
separated into water and solid in dewatering
unit i.e. centrifuge. Solid fraction is
composted in vermi/maggot composting area
while the water passes through pipeline to
sewer irrigation in nearby farmland.
Cultivation of maggot/worm is designed to
fulfill the demand of birds/chicken feed.
Calculation of equipments size was conducted
based on mass balance shown in Table 3.
Detail specification of the equipments is
presented briefly as follow:

Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Fig. 2 Overview of the biogas plant process

Table 3 Composition of streams involved in the process Fig. 2 for the base case capacity of 4
tons/d (132 ton/year)

Stream 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Fruit Market Waste (t/d) 4 - 4 - - - 0 - - -
Moisture (kg/d) - - - - - 3478.0 696.0 - - 2782.0
Volatile Solid (VS) (kg/d) - - - - - 49.3 44.3 - - 4.9
Ash (kg/d) - - - - - 55.2 49.7 - - 5.5
Inorganic Sediment(kg/d) - 1 - - - - - - - -
CH
4
(m
3
/d) - - - 152 - - - - - -
CO
2
(m
3
/d) - - - 148 - - - - - -
Electricity (kWh/d) - - - - 494 - - - - -
Maggot/Worm (kg/d) - - - - - - - - 5 -
Fertilizer (kg/d) - - - - - - - 75 - -
Total 4 1 4 300 494 3582.5 790 75 5 2792.4

Waste Collection
Organic fraction of fruit market waste is
collected using carts by workers (3 or 4
persons) starting on 8 am till 4 pm from
garbage bins located in each shop. It has to be
ensured that no inorganic materials mixed up
with the organic one.

Pretreatment
This pretreatment stage is aimed to provide
the most suitable feedstock for anaerobic
digestion. It includes crushing, temporary
storage and feeding pump system. A
commercial organic crusher provided by JWC
Environmental (UK), Anton Unterwurzacher
Maschinenbau GmbH (Austria), Bomatic
Umwelt- und Verfahrenstechnik GmbH
(Germany), Jiangyin Guangfu Machinery Co.,
Ltd Franklin Miller Inc. (US, Glen Creston
Ltd. (UK) is recommended. Crushing process
shall be carried out for 4 hours leading to
capacity 1 ton/h. This capacity is estimated
consume power 2 kW.
Temporary storage was designed to
accommodate any failure of the digestion
process so that 2 days retention time was
selected. Accordingly, volume of the storage
is 8 m
3
(2 m x 2 m x 2 m). Feeding pump
system is necessary to ensure that sticky
crushed fruit market waste passes through
pipe without any clogging into digester.
Inside the digester, end pipe of feeding
system is submerged in particular water clog
to prevent air (oxygen).
Crushing
Temporary
Storage
Anerobic
Digestion
Electricity
Generation
Dewatering
Vermi
composting
Electricity
Organic
fertilizer
Worm
WaterIrrigation
Fruit
Market
Waste
Inorganic
Sediment
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Digester
This bioreactor has volume 200 m
3
(42 days
of HRT). It is a cylindrical vertical tank, flat
bottom & roof. Dimension of the tank is 6.4
m in diameter; 6.4 m in height with 5.22 m
substrate level. Material construction is
reinforced concrete in order to provide robust
equipment which withstands any vibration of
transportation vehicles in the market;
earthquake and climate. It is equipped with
two height-adjustable-submerged agitators
which are located 2 meter and 3.5 meter
respectively from the bottom of digester. It
also installed with thermometer, manometer,
and level meter. To ensure safety operation,
water clog system is connected to biogas
outlet pipeline. Top of digester is layered with
EPDM membrane to ensure that there is no
leakage of biogas to atmosphere.

Generator
To convert biogas into electricity is the main
duty of this equipment. It has to be able to
work with biogas characteristics as biogas
temperature 40C, biogas pressure is 3-10
kPa with pressure fluctuation 1kPa/menit,
concentration of CH440%, fluctuation
2%/menit, H
2
S200 mg/Nm
3
, NH
3
20
mg/Nm
3
, granule 5m, granule30 mg/Nm
3
,
moisture 40 g/Nm
3
. A commercial generator
from Shengdong Company, China is
recommended. Output capacity of the
generator is 30 kW and 220 V.

Dewatering Unit
To separate water and solid material in
residual digestate sludge, a screw extractor
centrifuge manufactured by Qingdao Gaoxiao
Heavy Industry Machinery Manufacture
Co.,Ltd is recommended. It has capacity 1-2
tones/h and power consumption is 45 kW
working from 1.5 hours.

Vermi-composting and Irrigation
Composting of solid fraction of residual
digestate sludge occupies 16 m
2
(4 m x 4 m)
with aerobic fermentation takes place for 21
days. It is an windrow composting system
seeded firstly with suitable worm and/or
maggot. Compost and worm production are
estimated 75 kg/d and 5 kg/d respectively.
Whereas, irrigation system has already
available in farmland area so that only piping
system from the biogas plant to farming
sewer is needed. It is estimated to have 15
meter of 4 inch PVC pipe.
3.3. Electricity

Based on theoretical biogas production, it
is assumed that only 80% of biogas can be
recovered from the anaerobic digestion
process. So that total biogas production is 300
nm
3
/d containing 50.65% of methane (CH
4
).
Energy content of methane is 39 MJ/m
3
so
that total energy content of biogas is 5.9
GW/d. Generator is working well with
efficiency 30% gives 20.6 kW electricity or
494 kWh/d of electricity (0.16 GWh/a with
330 working-days per year).
To run this biogas plant some portion of
the electricity is used. It is mainly for
powering crusher, agitators, pumping system
and dewatering unit which is 104 kWh/d
electricity (21% of the generated electricity).
The rest is used to light on market.

4. CONCLUSION
The biogas plant design along with the
concept of integrated fruit market waste
management offers profound benefits in
creating good fruit market waste management
as well as sustaining energy supply. Through
implementation of the concept, one is able to
produce renewable energy (biogas) which can
be converted into electricity; to provide
aesthetically clean environment at the market;
to prevent odor pollution; and to mitigate
Global Warming Potential.
Moreover, organic fertilizer and water
irrigation are able to be produced from the
installation which can be utilized by farmers
to increase agricultural production. This
concept is so simple that possibly applicable
to any other market throughout Indonesia.
Therefore, dissemination of the concept will
support the endeavor to achieve Millenium
Renews 2010 Renewable Energy Conference, Berlin, Germany.
12 - 13 October 2010

Development Goals (MDGs) in waste

management and renewable energy
production.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

NUTEK, the Swedish Agency for Economic
and Regional Growth is gratefully
acknowledged for providing financial
support.

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