Novel pretreatment for recalcitrant biomass for biogas generation

A process to increase the amount of methane produced from a biodigester, said method comprising:

• providing a digester which comprises at least one organic material and at least one inoculum capable of converting a portion of said at least one organic material into methane under anaerobic conditions;
• providing a treated biomass which is substantially free of lignin in a range from 5 to 100% w/w of the total organic feedstock portion of the feed;
• adding said biomass to said digester;
• allowing sufficient time for the digester to degrade at least a portion of said treated biomass and at least a portion of said organic material to yield a biogas composition comprising methane;
• capturing said biogas composition;
• and
• optionally, storing said biogas.

A method of using recalcitrant biomass in the production of methane from a bio-digester, said method comprising:

• providing a recalcitrant biomass wherein said biomass comprises a lignin content above 10% of the dry weight of said biomass;
• exposing said highly recalcitrant biomass to a delignification reaction wherein said delignification reaction comprising the exposure of said highly recalcitrant biomass to an acidic composition comprising a modified Caro's acid for a period of time sufficient to yield a treated biomass which has a final lignin content of up to 100% less than the initial lignin content of the biomass;
• providing a digester whose contents comprise at least one inoculum comprising a microbial community capable of converting organic material into methane under anaerobic conditions;
• adding said treated biomass to said digester;
• optionally, adding at least one organic material;
• allowing sufficient time for the digester to degrade at least a portion of said treated biomass and optionally, at least a portion of said organic material to yield a biogas composition comprising methane;
• capturing said biogas composition;
• and
• storing said biogas.