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Anaerobic Digestion
Anaerobic digestion is a sequence of processes by which microorganisms break down biodegradable material in the absence of oxygen.[1] The process is used for industrial or domestic purposes to manage waste or to produce fuels. Much of the fermentation used industrially to produce food and drink products, as well as home fermentation, uses anaerobic digestion.
Anaerobic digestion occurs naturally in some soils and in lake and oceanic basin sediments, where it is usually referred to as "anaerobic activity".[2][3] This is the source of marsh gas methane as discovered by Alessandro Volta in 1776.[4][5]
The digestion process begins with bacterial hydrolysis of the input materials. Insoluble organic polymers, such as carbohydrates, are broken down to soluble derivatives that become available for other bacteria. Acidogenic bacteria then convert the sugars and amino acids into carbon dioxide, hydrogen, ammonia, and organic acids. In acetogenesis, bacteria convert these resulting organic acids into acetic acid, along with additional ammonia, hydrogen, and carbon dioxide amongst other compounds. Finally, methanogens convert these products to methane and carbon dioxide.[6] The methanogenic archaea populations play an indispensable role in anaerobic wastewater treatments.[7]
Anaerobic digestion is used as part of the process to treat biodegradable waste and sewage sludge. As part of an integrated waste management system, anaerobic digestion reduces the emission of landfill gas into the atmosphere. Anaerobic digesters can also be fed with purpose-grown energy crops, such as maize.[8]
Anaerobic digestion is widely used as a source of renewable energy. The process produces a biogas, consisting of methane, carbon dioxide, and traces of other 'contaminant' gases.[1] This biogas can be used directly as fuel, in combined heat and power gas engines[9] or upgraded to natural gas-quality biomethane. The nutrient-rich digestate also produced can be used as fertilizer.
With the re-use of waste as a resource and new technological approaches that have lowered capital costs, anaerobic digestion has in recent years received increased attention among governments in a number of countries, among these the United Kingdom (2011),[10] Germany,[citation needed] Denmark (2011),[11] and the United States.[12]
North Lincolnshire is a unitary authority area with borough status in Lincolnshire, England. At the 2011 Census, it had a population of 167,446.[2] The administrative centre and largest settlement is Scunthorpe, and the borough also includes the towns of Brigg, Broughton, Haxey, Crowle, Epworth, Bottesford, Winterton, Kirton in Lindsey and Barton-upon-Humber. North Lincolnshire is part of the Yorkshire and the Humber region. The borough is mostly rural in character aside from near the town of Scunthorpe and near the Port of Immingham where most of the nearby villages and towns form part of the wider urban areas.
North Lincolnshire was formed following the abolition of Humberside County Council in 1996, when four unitary authorities replaced it, North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire, on the south bank of the Humber Estuary, and the East Riding of Yorkshire and Kingston upon Hull on the north bank.
Kirton in Lindsey, one of the towns of North Lincolnshire
It is home to the Haxey Hood, a traditional event which takes place in Haxey on 6 January, a large football scrum where a leather tube (the "hood") is pushed to one of four pubs, where it remains until next year's game.
