Biofuels & Bioenergy

Biofuels represent a sustainable option to fossil fuels, since they are sufficiently similar to themand derived from potentially renewable, non-food sources (biological wastes). In this perspective, wastewaters high carbohydrate content can be exploited for the biomass growth and biofuels production. Thus, classical wastewater treatments could berecast for biofuels production from waste sludge. Two microorganisms phyla are able to convert nutrients in wastewater into biofuels: microalgae, transforming light and carbohydrates into biofuels through a photosynthetic path, and Clostridia, spontaneously present in civil wastewaters, which convert carbohydrates into methane and hydrogen through a solventogenic pattern. In this work, we present a study about the combination of wastewater treatment plants with biofuels production (biohydrogen and biogas by Clostridia activity). In this perspective, the wastewater remediation and reuse would come side by side with the production of biofuels by integrating specific devices (bioreactors for biofuels production) into the consolidated technology of biological wastewater treatment plants, with a high economical and environmental gain.