The anaerobic digestion technology has been in existence for centuries and its underlying theory established for decades. It is considered a useful technology for the generation of renewable energy, and provides means to alleviate problems associated with low access to energy. However, a great deal of current research is targeted towards the optimization of this technology under diverse digestion process conditions. This review presents an in-depth analysis of the chemistry of anaerobic digestion and discusses how process chemistry can be used to optimize system performance through identification of methods that can accelerate syntrophic interactions of different microorganisms for improved methanogenic reactions. Recent advances in addition to old research are discussed in order to offer a general but comprehensive synopsis of accumulated knowledge in the theory of anaerobic digestion, as well as an overview of previous research and future directions and opportunities of the AD technology. Achieving a sustainable energy system requires comprehensive reforms in not just economic, social and policy aspects, but also in all technical aspects, which represents one of the most crucial future investments for anaerobic digestion systems.

This paper characterizes various locally available agricultural residues in South Asian region to evaluate their potential as feedstock for renewable energy production and contributing toward solving energy crisis and environmental issues. The thermo-chemical characterization has been performed in order to determine if the residues have potential to be used in biomass conversion technologies producing combined heat and power. The characterization methods for comparing different agricultural residues include proximate and ultimate analysis, heating value, ash content, thermo gravimetric analysis (TGA) and structural composition analysis (SCA). Widely available agricultural wastes in South Asian region were selected for the characterization i.e. bagasse, almond shell, corn cob, cotton stalks, wheat straw, sawdust, corn leaf, rice husk, rice straw, and corn straw. The analysis showed that the corn cob had the highest moisture content that will result in low energy efficiency of the thermal conversion technology due to energy requirement for drying. Whereas almond shell had the lowest moisture content. Ash and volatile contents were found to be highest in rice straw and almond shell respectively. The thermo gravimetric analysis showed that most of the agricultural residues can be easily decomposed and represent potential feedstock for biomass flexible combined heat and power systems through pyrolysis or gasification