Stopford has jointly authored a recently published paper on the impacts of biochar on anaerobic digestion. Stopford’s PhD student, Michael Fagbohungbe, conducted the laboratory trials using mini-digesters and citrus peel as the feedstock. Citrus is known to be problematic in digestion through the inhibitory effects of a chemical called limonene. Biochar was dosed inside the reactors for the duration of the batch. The trials led to the following conclusions:

• The presence of biochar material reduced the impact of limonene on AD.
• Wood biochar had the shortest microbial lag phase.
• Increasing the biochar citrus peel ratio reduced lag phase prior to the onset of methanogenesis.
• Biochar supported the colonization of methanogenic microflora.

A copy of the full article can be accessed here: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960852416306022