The utilisation of zeolites for the reduction of ammonium concentration in biogas processes

The aim of this study was to determine the impact of the utilisation of zeolites in the removal of ammonium from systems of biological the transformation of organic substrates to biogas during methane fermentation. The results showed that the highest efficiency of removal of ammonium from digestate was achieved with a 10 g/dm³ dose of zeolite. This efficiency was from 37.87 ± 0.54% to 46.01 ± 0.8%. The experiment demonstrated a linear relationship between the dose of zeolite in the range from 1 g/dm³ to 10 g/dm³ and the efficiency of the sorption and the final concentration of N-NH₄. The highest sorption of N-NH₄ was observed in a variant with the zeolite dose of 1 g/dm³ and it was from 161.74 ± 2.01 mg N-NH₄/g to 132 ± 4.7 mg N-NH₄/g in the digestate and from 112 ± 8.54 mg N-NH₄/g to 122 ± 12.90 mg N-NH₄/g in the effluent from digestate.