In an anaerobic system, the majority of the chemical energy contained within the starting material is released by methanogenic archaea as methane.

Populations of anaerobic microorganisms typically take a significant period of time to establish themselves to be fully effective. Therefore, common practice is to introduce anaerobic microorganisms from materials with existing populations, a process known as "seeding" the digesters, typically accomplished with the addition of sewage sludge or cattle slurry.

Process stages

The

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