TY - JOUR AV - none N2 - Palm oil mill effluent (POME) is a highly polluted wastewater that consists of a high organic content of 4â??5 total solids; a potential renewable energy source. A waste to energy study was conducted to improve biogas production using POME as substrate by ultrasonication pretreatment at mesophilic temperatures. The effect of temperature on the specific growth rate of anaerobes and methanogenic activity was investigated. Five sets of assays were carried out at operating temperatures between 25 °C and 45 °C. Each set consisted of two experiments using identical anaerobic sequencing batch reactors (AnSBR); fed with raw POME (control) and sonicated POME, respectively. The ultrasonication was set at 16.2 min ultrasonication time and 0.88 W mLâ??1 ultrasonication density with substrate total solids concentration of 6 (w/v). At 25 °C, biogas production rate and organic matter removal exhibited lowest values for both reactors. The maximum organic degradation was 96 from AnSBR operated at 30 °C fed with sonicated POME and 91 from AnSBR operated at 35 °C fed with unsonicated POME. In addition, the methane yield from AnSBR operated at 30 °C was enhanced by 21.5 after ultrasonication pretreatment. A few normality tests and a t-test were carried out. Both tests indicated that the residuals of the experimental data were normality distributed with mean equals to zero. The results demonstrated that ultrasonication treatment was a promising pretreatment to positively affect the organic degradation and biogas production rates at 30â??35 °C. © 2018 Elsevier B.V. N1 - cited By 35 KW - Batch reactors; Biogas; Effluents; Palm oil; Renewable energy resources; Substrates; Temperature; Ultrasonics KW - Anaerobic sequencing batch reactors; Biogas production rates; Mesophilic temperature; Organic matter removal; Palm oil mill effluents; Renewable energy source; Total solids concentrations; Ultrasonication pretreatment KW - Anaerobic digestion KW - biogas; methane; organic matter; palm oil; biofuel KW - anaerobic digestion; anoxic conditions; biogas; concentration (composition); effluent; essential oil; ultrasonics; wastewater treatment KW - anaerobic digestion; Article; biofuel production; concentration (parameter); controlled study; degradation; effluent; growth rate; mesophilic temperature; methanogenesis; nonhuman; palm oil mill effluent; priority journal; solid; temperature; ultrasonication; ultrasound; anaerobic growth; bioreactor; industrial waste KW - Anaerobiosis; Biofuels; Bioreactors; Industrial Waste; Methane; Palm Oil ID - scholars12996 TI - Improved anaerobic digestion of palm oil mill effluent and biogas production by ultrasonication pretreatment Y1 - 2020/// SN - 00489697 PB - Elsevier B.V. UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85081693828&doi=10.1016%2fj.scitotenv.2020.137833&partnerID=40&md5=69c7bb341dc8c6ace2f64750a62f55bc JF - Science of the Total Environment A1 - Isa, M.H. A1 - Wong, L.-P. A1 - Bashir, M.J.K. A1 - Shafiq, N. A1 - Kutty, S.R.M. A1 - Farooqi, I.H. A1 - Lee, H.C. VL - 722 ER -