Use of biodiesel byproduct in agriculture

Attila Kovács¹, Imre Czinkota¹, Alexa Nagy¹, Ibrahim Issa², László Tolner¹

¹ Department for Soil Science and Agricultural Chemistry, Szent István University, Páter Károly Street, H-2103 Gödöllő, Hungary,

attilawise@gmail.com

² Department of Soil and Water, Agriculture Faculty, Sirte University,Sirte, Libya

Contaminated glycerol as a byproduct from biodiesel production is available in increasing amounts. The conventional utilization of glycerol can not be substantially increased, therefore investigation of alternative ways of useage should be searched for. The contamination content of the glycerol byproduct mainly consist of useful materials from plant seeds and potassium hydroxide catalyst, which enhance potassium structure of soil and compensate soil acidity. Methanol can also be present as a toxic substance, which is used for transesterification. Glycerol such as sugars represents an easily accessible source of energy for microorganisms in soil. It is well known that if nitrogen poor organic matter (e.g. straw) added into the soil, it can cause, trough assistance of microbes, temporary reduction of the nitrogen supply. This could inhibit plant growth.

The aim of our experiments was to examine how the soil nitrogen management can be regulated by a biodiesel byproduct which contains glycerol. For this purpose a pot experiment was established with ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.). Our research has not only studied the impact of biomass productions, but variations in the rate of plant growth as an effect of different treatments were observed as well. Based on our investigations we found that the soil nutrient management can be effectively regulated by industrial byproduct glycerol usage to soil.