Fuel 329 (2022) 125416

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Anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge for biogas & biohydrogen production:

State-of-the-art trends and prospects
Muhammad Usmaan Bin Khawer a, Salman Raza Naqvi a, *, Imtiaz Ali b, Muazzam Arshad c,
Dagmar Juchelková d, Muhammad Waqas Anjum e, Muhammad Naqvi f
a
School of Chemical & Materials Engineering, National University of Sciences & Technology, Pakistan
b
Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, King Abdulaziz University, Rabigh, Saudi Arabia
c
Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Engineering & Technology, Peshawar, KPK, Pakistan
d
Department of Electronics, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, VŠB-Technical University of Ostrava, 17. listopadu 15/2172, 708 00 Ostrava,
Poruba, Czech Republic
e
Department of Chemical Engineering, Abu Dhabi Men’s Campus, Higher Colleges of Technology, United Arab Emirates
f
College of Engineering and Technology, American University of the Middle East, Kuwait

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Advancement in the anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge for biogas production is constantly required for
Anaerobic digestion effective commercialization. There is great interest in exploring the scientometric and technical assessment in
Sewage sludge biogas production using sewage sludge from various sources in the anaerobic digestion process. Therefore, this
Biogas, Bibliometric analysis
work provides a bibliometric and technical study of anaerobic digestion for biogas production from sewage
Technical assessment
sludge in the last ten years, based on Web of Science data. The vital parameters of the bibliometric study are
authors, countries, and institutional collaboration along with the authors’ keywords. In terms of technical
assessment, challenges are highlighted with critical analysis of previous work performed both on a laboratory
scale and on a pilot scale. The study recommends key considerations and new combination techniques to enhance
biohydrogen production with optimized process conditions which will provide vital economic impact for tech­
nological adaptation and commercialization.

1. Introduction
Sewage sludge is produced mainly as a by-product of water treat­
ment from a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) and is used for the
reclamation and reuse of water [1,2]. WWTP sludge can be classified as
primary or secondary sludge [3]. While the primary sludge is the solid
material accumulated from sedimentation processes, the secondary or
activated sludge is produced from a biological treatment plant, which
contains high levels of active microbes [4,5]. A large portion of the
organic matter produced is in a solid form known as biosolid [6]. The
disposal of this sludge is also a detriment to the ecosystem as a result of
the potential contamination of soil and water [7]. Sludge management
can cost half the cost of the wastewater treatment plant [8,9]. Taking
into account the huge volume of sewage sludge generation by WWTP, it
becomes imperative to focus on its management. In a recent study, the
sewage sludge production in leading developed European countries such
as Germany (1258 from 10,431 WWTP plants), Netherlands (80 from
268), France (88 from 687), Switzerland (475 from 634) were shown as
case study [10].
Anaerobic digestion is commonly used to stabilize the sludge and is
defined as the natural process of breakdown of organic material by
microorganisms in the absence of air [11,12]. This process results in
stabilization of the sludge along with the production of biogases such as
carbon dioxide and methane [13]. The commercial value of the anaer­
obic digestion process of the sludge is derived from the production of
methane, which is the main component (55–65 %) of biogas, making it a
viable energy resource [14]. This is achieved by converting volatile
solids into biogas (CH4 and CO2) with H2O as contaminant [15]. The
biogas then undergoes additional processing in order to be collected and
utilized as a fuel [16]. In conventional digesters processing sewage
sludge, the specific generation of CH4 typically ranges from 0.19 to 0.24
Nm3 kg volatile solids m− 1 and is dependent on the solid retention time
(SRT) used in the wastewater treatment line [17]. Due to the presence of
large complex macromolecules, the hydrolysis stage, which is the first

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: salman.raza@scme.nust.edu.pk (S.R. Naqvi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2022.125416
Received 20 April 2022; Received in revised form 7 July 2022; Accepted 24 July 2022
Available online 30 July 2022
0016-2361/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
M.U.B. Khawer et al.
Fig. 1. (a) WoS categories of anaerobic digestion sewage sludge clustered into five domains and (b) evolution of publications by types and citation count in the
last decade.
stage of the anaerobic digestion process, is limited, resulting in the need
for large reactor volumes and longer hydraulic retention times.
Although research advancements in anaerobic digestion for biogas
production using sewage sludge are an ongoing phenomenon, with new
developments occurring continuously, there is no concrete study to
show its impact on scientometric analysis using statistical methods to
provide a general outline and overall structure of the research work.
According to the authors’ information, this is the first kind of study to
present a statistical and quantitative literature evaluation that system­
atically compiles citations, publications, and rapid development based
on keywords in the anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge for the pro­
duction of biogas and biohydrogen. Therefore, before this, to the best of
our knowledge, no bibliometric analysis of the anaerobic digestion of
sewage sludge has been published yet. The purpose of this study is to
analyze the area of anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge for biogas
production in the last 10 years (2012–01-01 to 2021–12-3), based on the
Web of Science (WoS) database. In parallel, a technical assessment was
also presented to identify challenges for biohydrogen production for
further exploration.
2
Fuel 329 (2022) 125416
2. Anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge: bibliometric analysis
Anaerobic digestion is a promising and cost-effective microbiological
process for converting organic waste into biogas. This process has been
known for so long to treat food waste that is increasing with population
growth. Primary and secondary treatment of wastewater treatment
plants generate large volumes of organic waste. The sludge from these
plants is concentrated through flotation, centrifugation, dewatering, etc.
The amount and composition of the sludge depend on the source, such as
domestic or industrial, as well as the operating conditions of the
downstream treatment units [18]. If not handled carefully, this difficult
waste can cause irrevocable environmental changes. To investigate
previous works on anerobic digestion of sewage sludge, a literature re­
view was conducted with the help of available bibliometric tools.
2.1. Data collection
The core collection of Clarivate’s Web of Science (WoS) was inves­
tigated for all entries in the literature on the topic of “(TS=(anaerobic
AND digestion AND sewage AND sludge)) AND ((LA==(“ENGLISH”))
M.U.B. Khawer et al. Fuel 329 (2022) 125416

Fig. 2. Sankey diagram of countries, keywords, and journals of publications.

2.2. Trends in research

Table 1
Most relevant publications on the anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge in the
The WoS categories of all published literature were overlayed [9]
last decade.
and clustered using VoSviewer [22], as shown in Fig. 1(a). It can be seen
Sr. Paper TC TC Normalized Ref.
that most of the work on anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge is
No. per TC
year
concentrated in Environmental Science & Ecology and Energy & Fuels.
The temporal evolution of the publications and their citation count
1 Yang G, Water 591 73.5 17.1 (Yang et al.,
highlight the exponential growth in the previous decade, as shown in
Research (2015) 2015)
2 Ariunbaatar J, 489 54.3 12.4 (Ariunbaatar Fig. 1(b). The increasing attention of the scientific community on this
Applied Energy et al., 2014) topic is quite evident.
(2014) The Sankey diagram provides of country, keyword, and source is
3 Inyang M, Bioresource 476 43.3 10.4 (Inyang et al.,
shown in Fig. 2. It describes the contribution of a country towards the
Technology (2012) 2012)
4 Sundberg C, FEMS 460 45.7 11.9 (Sundberg et al.,
topics in the relevant journals. It is clear from the figure that China
Microbiology Ecology 2013) dominates research on the anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge, with
(2013) most of the work published in the Bioresource Technology journal.
5 Mahon AM, 334 55.2 13.5 (Mohan et al.,
Environmental 2006)
Science & Technology 2.3. Highly cited papers
(2017)
6 Franke-Whittle IH, 294 32.6 7.4 (Franke-Whittle The top ten most cited publications on anaerobic digestion of sewage
Waste Management et al., 2014)
sludge are presented in Table 1. With 591 citations, (Yang et al., 2015) is
(2014)
7 Yang Y, Water 282 31.3 7.1 (Yang et al., the highly cited paper with highest total citations (TC) per year. Their
Research (2014) 2014) research work also accumulated the highest normalized TC and is
8 Duan N, Bioresource 281 25.5 6.1 (Duan et al., therefore considered a hot paper in the list. (Ariunbaatar et al., 2014)
Technology (2012) 2012) counted the second most citations in the list.
9 Verlicchi P, Science of 269 33.6 7.8 (Verlicchi and
The Total Zambello, 2015)
Environment (2015) 2.4. Main journals and prominent authors
10 Dai X, Waste 247 24.7 6.4 (Dai et al.,
Management (2013) 2013)
The 10 most relevant journals and prominent authors for their work
on anerobic digestion of sewage sludge are listed in Table 2. Most of the
NOT (DT==(“REVIEW”)))” during the last ten years (from 2012-01-01 articles appeared in the Bioresource Technology journal, accumulating
to 2021-12-31). The search, which was made on 4th of June 2022, the highest total citations and the h-index. However, the ratio of total
returned 3,645 documents. The parsing and analysis of the WoS corpus citation count to total number of publications (TC/NP) was the highest
was performed using CorTexT [19] and bibliometrix package of R for the Water Research journal, indicating that an article on average in
[20,21]. The corpus contained mainly research articles (3,637 in the Water Research journal generated more citations than in the Bio­
numbers) followed by proceeding papers (110 in counts). resource Technology journal. Dai XH published most articles followed
by Dong B and Li YY. Dai, XH also received the highest citation count of

Table 2
The most relevant journals and prominent authors for anerobic digestion of sewage sludge.
Sr. No. Publication Titles NP TC h index Author NP TC h index

1 Bioresource Technology 451 15,072 60 Dai XH 91 3076 27

2 Water Research 157 7363 52 Dong B 48 1960 21
3 Waste Management 167 4873 39 Li YY 46 1333 20
4 Applied Energy 60 3432 34 Wang DB 32 1166 21
5 Science of the Total Environment 146 3131 31 Angelidaki I 25 1120 16
6 Chemical Engineering Journal 99 3023 32 Dai LL 24 1086 15
7 Journal of Cleaner Production 121 2921 30 Ni BJ 26 1078 18
8 Environmental Science & Technology 37 2443 24 Wang QL 22 1070 18
9 Journal of Environmental Management 110 2245 28 Yang Q 27 1060 19
10 Renewable Energy 68 1655 27 Li XM 23 1043 18

3
M.U.B. Khawer et al.
Fig. 3. Co-occurrence map of the terms extracted from title, abstract, and keywords.
Fig. 4. Thematic evolution of the topics.
3076 with an h-index of 27. 27 papers from Wang QL received the
highest TC/NP of 48.6.
3. Research fronts
Five most frequently used keywords by the authors were anaerobic
digestion, sewage sludge, methane production, biogas production, and
wastewater treatment. The co-occurrence map of the most frequent
terms in the title and abstract of the publications is shown in Fig. 3.
Minimum number of co-occurrences of a term was selected to be 60,
with this threshold only 300 terms qualified out of a total of 55,273
terms present in the corpus. The network reveals the links between the
terms in the form of three clusters [23]. The red cluster contains most of
the terms related to secondary wastewater treatment; the green cluster
highlights the pretreatment & biological process, while the blue cluster
reveals the digestion & yield of products.
4
Fuel 329 (2022) 125416
The thematic analysis in Fig. 4 was constructed from 250 most
frequent topics during five periods of 2012–2013, 2014–2015,
2016–2017, 2018–2019 and 2020–2021 respectively, Sewage sludge
appeared throughout the periods while thermal pretreatment was
highlighted only during 2020–2021 as an emerging topic.
The chemical composition of sewage sludge makes it a suitable
candidate to recover carbon in the form of biomethane through anerobic
digestion. Anaerobic digestion not only handles this organic waste but
also produces bioenergy, captures, and stores carbon. Most studies
focused on biochemical methods to improve the hydrolysis stage of the
anaerobic digestion process [22]. Improving the access of the inoculum
to carbohydrates, proteins, and lipids present in organic waste increases
the conversion productivity.
M.U.B. Khawer et al. Fuel 329 (2022) 125416

Bio products
Anaerobic • Biogas
digestion • Liquid digestate
• Solid digestate
Pretreatment • Hydrolysis
• Acidogenesis
• Physical
• Acetogenesis
• Biological
Dewatering • Methanogenesis
• Chemical
• Thickening • Thermal

Sewage
Sludge

Fig. 5. Pathways of the production of bioproducts from sewage sludge through anaerobic digestion.

Table 3
Biogas production of different anerobic digesters along with scale, operating parameter, and source.
Sr Source Digester Scale Operating Parameter Biogas Comments Ref.
No Yield
Temperature Residence pH
(◦ C) time (days)

1 Sewage Semi-continuous reactor Semi- 35 – – – Biogas yields decreased as a result of the [24]
sludge continuous accumulation of wollastonite in a
reactor semicontinuous stage.
2 Sewage Solid state anerobic Pilot 37 7.14 Biogas At thermophilic temperature, volatile [25]
Treatment digester (12.3 ton/ solids were reduced by 88 % with a ratio
plant day) of food waste to sewage sludge ratio of 2:1
3 Sewage Batch reactor Lab – – – – Hydrothermal method used before [26]
sludge anaerobic digestion, which increases
biogas production
4 Domestic Up flow Anerobic Lab 23.2 35 7.4 Biogas 70 to 180 % more energy was produced [27]
sewage Sludge blanket digestion (331.2 L/ using co-digestion process
Sludge kg), CH4
(63.63 %)
5 Municipal Hydrothermal Processing Pilot 35 15 min – – The HTP process resulted in a higher [28]
Sewage of Sewage Sludge energy recovery rate.
Sludge
6 Sewage thermophilic digesters Pilot 35–55 44 – CH4 (60 Biogas desulfurization was achieved [29]
Sludge with %), CO2 under different conditions, such as
Food waste (32 %) residual oxygen of 0.2 to 2 %, oxygen
loading rates of 1.5 to 2.3 kg volatile
solids/m3d-1, and HRT of 44 to 71 days
7 Sewage thermophilic digesters Pilot 35–55 44 – CH4 (60 Biogas desulfurization was achieved over [29]
Sludge with %), CO2 81 weeks under various residual oxygen
Food waste (32 %) (0.2 to 2.0 %), oxygen loading rate (1.5 to
2.3 kg volatile solids/m3 d-1) and HRT (44
to 71 days) conditions.
8 Sewage bio-electrochemical Lab 35 10 – CH4 (75.2 Methane production rate of 1,339 mL/L [30]
treatment anaerobic digester %) d− 1 and energy efficiency of 98.7 %
plant
9 Urban Two stage anerobic Bench 36.82 15–39 7.42 CH4 Implementation to both batch and full [31]
wastewater digester (acidogenic (56.66 scale in future, Physiochemical
sewage digester and methanogenic %), CO2 parameters effect the bioreactors
sludge digester) (32.13 %)
10 Sewage dual-digestion & thermal Pilot 35–37 20 days – Biogas Pre-treatments to hydrolyze sludge to [8]
sludge from phase anaerobic digester (32–35 %) improve production of biogas
WWTP

4. Anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge: technical analysis
Fig. 5 shows the pathway of conversion of sewage sludge to the
formation of bioproducts (biogas, liquid digestate, and solid digestate).
In the initial phase after dewatering, the first stage is pretreatment. The
pretreatment process is classified mainly into physical, biological,
chemical, and thermal treatments. The second phase will be the diges­
tion process, which will follow the hydrolysis, acidogenesis, aceto­
genesis, and methanogenesis processes. However, biogas production
depends mainly on the selection of the digester, operational parameters,

5
M.U.B. Khawer et al. Fuel 329 (2022) 125416

Table 4 aspects on the anaerobic digestion process. Table 4 provides research

Yield of hydrogen from anaerobic digestion and challenges.
Challenges
To investigate the impact of addition of manure
to co-digestion of sludge and wine vinasse
could enhance the hydrogen production or not.
To explore the potential of green hydrogen by
integration of AD to
Dry reforming process.
Syngas composition depends on reaction
temperature, while biogas impurities such as
H2S and siloxanes decrease conversion
efficiency during dry reforming.
Examine the novel combination of AD and
electrodialysis processes for enhanced
biohydrogen production.
Anerobic digestion of food waste is difficult. The
resistance of the reforming catalyst (Ni-
CeZrO2) to sintering needs further
investigation.
• Variability in biomass compositions and its
availability
• CH4/CO2 ratio needs adjustments in feed
• Dry reforming reaction is highly endothermic
in nature
• H2S, may cause catalyst poisoning or
deactivation
• NH3 and other trace substances are present in
biogas
Explore the co-digestion mechanism of sewage
sludge and food waste for hydrogen
production
The addition of more than 3 % glycerol leads to
instabilities in process parameters such as an
increase in pH and a reduction in the yield of
methane due to the build-up of metabolic
products during anaerobic digestion.
Anerobic digestion of the sludges results in the
production of H2 accompanied by the
production of acetate and butyrate.
Heat-treated sludge gives shorter and lower
H2 production than co-digestion.
challenges adopted by the researcher and biohydrogen production.
H2 Production Ref. Firstly, the co-digestion process showed a vital impact on volatile fatty
acid and hydrogen production because of availability of viable bacteria.
18.20 % H2 with 10 g/L [34]
of and 27.57 % Secondly, the integration of anaerobic digestion process with electro­
H2 with 20 g/L of dialysis or reforming process impact positively on enhance biohydrogen
poultry manure production. Thirdly, pre-treatment significantly impact to accelerate the
0.168 kg/h H2 per kg/h [35] hydrolysis, improve the organic utilization, shorten the lag phase and
of biogas
results into contributing the improvement of biohydrogen yield. A re­
– [36] view of the literature is summarized in the below Table 4.
4.2. Impact of configurations
33.68 mL of H2/g of [37]
volatile solid Fig. 6 shows various configurations of anaerobic digestion used for
the treatment of sewage sludge. In the first scheme (Fig. 6a), primary
151 L of H2 / kg of food [26] and secondary sludge is processed in two steps operation. Firstly, biogas
waste is produced in digester and then digestate concentrates along with solid
cake can be obtained from dewatering process. This is the true example
– [38] of a conventional setup. Apart from such conventional setup, Fig. 6b
demonstrated the batch thermal hydrolysis scheme. This scheme dif­
ferentiates from conventional setup by introducing hydrolysis reactor
before the digester. Thermal hydrolysis has been established as a
required pretreatment for the anaerobic digestion process mostly case a
& b. It can increase the productivity and capacity of existing facilities
with improved sludge dewatering. In contrary to conventional and
thermal hydrolysis schemes, intermediate thermal hydrolysis (Cambi™
62.39 mL of H2/g VS [39]
and Exelys™ DLD) is the advanced integrated configuration to obtained
polygeneration. In Cambi™ SolidStream®, configuration (d), the ther­
92.5 mL of H2/g VS [40] mal hydrolysis unit is placed after the digester. Dewatering of the hot
digested sludge leaves centrate with high organic content which is re-
routed to the digester inlet. A barometric egg controls the pressure
and temperature variations of the hydrolyzed sludge.
51 mL of H2/g VS [41] In conclusion, Scheme 6c and 6d, provide a comprehensive inte­
grated configuration scheme to not only produce enhance biogas pro­
duction but also recycle the stream to get benefits for polygeneration.
0.74 mmol of H2/g VS [42]
4.3. Challenges

and biogas yield.
4.1. Biogas production
The production of biogas from sewage sludge is facing potential
research challenges. Biogas production with different digesters such as
solid state anerobic digester, semicontinuous reactor solid state anerobic
digester, hydrothermal processing of sewer sludge, thermophi­
lic digesters, two-stage anerobic digester (acidogenic digester and
methanogenic digester), dual-digestion and thermal phased anerobic
digester, bio-electrochemical anaerobic digester with operating param­
eters, scale, and source such as sewage treatment plant, sewage sludge
from food waste and municipal plant are described in Table 3. In
outcome, biogas yield and comments are mentioned in the table to
evaluate the process and to identify the research gaps in the processes.
Hence, more innovative work is required to improve the biogas yield.
4.1.1. Hydrogen production
Renewable hydrogen is gaining attention as a source of zero-carbon
energy as a result of increasing environmental awareness [32,33]. It can
be used in hydrogen fuel cells or hydrogen internal combustion engines
to power vehicles. Since hydrogen is not freely available in our atmo­
sphere (0.00005 % to be precise) it needs to be produced industrially.
Currently, hydrogen is obtained by steam reforming of methane gas,
biomass gasification, and electrolysis of water and solar fuel cells. Thus,
to produce renewable green hydrogen, anaerobic digestion process
could be adjusted in a way to enhance its production. However, the
research is on-going to explore biohydrogen potential from various
The current study is important to improve knowledge about the
existing issues and challenges related to the effective utilization of
sewage sludge to produce biogas using the anaerobic digestion process.
The most important challenges and issues that need to be addressed are
highlighted.
• Biogas hybridization: A review of anaerobic co-digestion of sewage
sludge and biomass through modeling and optimization of biogas
production indicates that biogas hybridization has not yet been
thoroughly explored [40,43]. Most of the research deals with
anaerobic mono-digestion, co-digestion of feedstocks, modeling, and
optimization. Further research is needed by adopting a multi-
objective approach employing all technical and economic factors
in modelling and optimization. Co-digestion requires optimization of
different feedstock mix. Modelling and optimization must incorpo­
rate seasonal variations in co-digestion feedstocks. Controlling pro­
cess conditions is also a key factor in achieving optimal biogas
production. Hybridization of biogas with energy sources (conven­
tional and nonconventional) needs further studies.
• Determining the optimal conditions for methane production: A study
on the residual characteristics of sewage sludge in mesophilic
anaerobic digestion by hydrothermal treatment indicates that indi­
vidual parameters and interaction of the main parameters must first
be established to define optimal conditions, also taking into account
sludge treatment as well as biogas production [40,44].
• Synergistic effects on methane production: A study on the anaerobic
co-digestion of sewage sludge and food waste shows that during
thermophilic and mesophilic conditions, under appropriate retention

6
M.U.B. Khawer et al.
Fig. 6. (a) Conventional digestion configuration setup, (b) batch thermal hydrolysis, (c) intermediate thermal hydrolysis (Cambi™ and Exelys™ DLD) (d) Cambi™
SolidStream®.
time, methane production improves [45,46]. Especially under mes­
ophilic conditions, which could otherwise present certain implica­
tions for engineering applications. The degradation of yard waste
could be improved by more diverse microbial communities with
greater metabolic diversity.
• Dynamic biogas production: Demand-driven biogas production is
viable compared to steady-state generation in different scenarios
[47]. Advanced mesophilic acid digestion (AMAD) supports flexible
digester management, while conventional mesophilic acid digestion
(CMAD) requires predefined feeding plans.
• Yield of the methanogenesis process: The study on the anaerobic co-
digestion of sewage sludge with poultry slaughterhouse wastes in a
batch bioreactor shows that the decrease in the inoculum substrate
ratio and the increase in total solid could drop pH, accumulate fatty
acids and ammonia and thus severely reduce the yields in the
methanogenesis process [48].
• Composition and seasonality effect: Studies on anaerobic digestion of
mixed sewage sludge (MSS) and waste from the fruits & vegetable
market show a slight improvement in biogas production and
methane production, however, the percentage volumetric relation
(PVR) remains unchanged between 40:60 and 100:0 [49].
• Synergy between solids and liquids of sludge: Synergy has been re­
ported between the solids and liquids of the sludge during anerobic
digestions [50]. The methane-rich biogas produced from the sludge
without the separation of the solids from the liquids was higher than
the sum of gases produced from the solids of the sludge and the
liquids of the sludge alone.
• Quality of digestate and biogas composition: anaerobic co-digestion
of sewage sludge with brewery waste under optimal conditions
shows insignificant impacts on digestate quality and biogas compo­
sition. The results further suggest that 2 kg /m3/d of Chemical
7
Fuel 329 (2022) 125416
Oxygen Demand (COD) with an increase in OLR from a carbon-rich
co-substrate can be supported by sewage sludge.
• Formation of toxic intermediates: A study on anaerobic digestion of
sewage sludge with a dried mixture of food waste with olive mill
wastewater, and cheese whey reveals the formation of toxic in­
termediates, accumulation of VFA, higher operational and trans­
portation costs, lower buffer capacity, and other process instabilities
as technological challenges to biogas production [51]. When the pH
drops at the beginning of digestion, inhibition of ammonia, hydrogen
sulfide, and long-chain fatty acids causes instability of the process. In
addition to these, an inappropriate reactor design carried out ac­
cording to the rule of thumb is another challenge. In general, the
characterization, development of bacterial activity, biodegrad­
ability, improvement of CH4 production, accessibility, and variation
in food waste are considered the main challenges to efficient biogas
production [52].
• Process instabilities: The use of 3 % glycerol for the co-digestion of
food waste and sewage sludge in a twin-stage anaerobic digestion
system leads to process instabilities, such as variation in pH and a
decrease in methane production [40]. These instabilities may arise
from the formation and accumulation of metabolic products during
anaerobic digestion.
• Co-digestion of sewage sludge and microalgae: The anaerobic
digestion of sewage sludge and microalgae is encouraging. However,
more research is needed to realize optimal conditions to achieve high
biogas yield [53].
• Biogas production and GHG reduction: Compared to landfill, the
reduction in GHG is an important environmental benefit achieved by
digesting municipal biomass waste (MBW) [54,55]. Therefore,
anaerobic co-digestion of MBW has emerged as a promising solution
for the management of municipal solid waste in China.
M.U.B. Khawer et al.
5. Conclusions
The study presents a state-of-the art analysis on biogas and bio­
hydrogen production from sewage sludge. The study combines the
knowledge of bibliometric analysis to provide the significance and
evaluation of research trends going on in this field. In a rapid technical
review, it was revealed that the impact of digestor, its scale and oper­
ational parameters with optimized conditions are part of on-going
research to explore the optimum production of biogas. For bio­
hydrogen production, pre-treatment, integration of co-digestion process
and techniques were highlighted as contributing factors for further yield
enhancement. Lastly, challenges and way forward is suggested to
explore viable options for new technology adaptation and
commercialization.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Muhammad Usmaan Bin Khawer: Writing – original draft. Salman
Raza Naqvi: Conceptualization, Project administration, Funding
acquisition. Imtiaz Ali: Writing – original draft, Data curation. Muaz­
zam Arshad: Validation. Dagmar Juchelková: Methodology, Writing –
original draft, Validation. Muhammad Waqas Anjum: Writing – review
& editing. Muhammad Naqvi: Writing – review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Data availability
No data was used for the research described in the article.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to acknowledge National University of Sci­
ences & Technology and Revgreen Pakistan for financial support
through academia-industry funding scheme.
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