Conventional Hydrothermal Carbonization of Shrimp Waste

Shrimp is among the most consumed seafood across the world. Shrimp-processing operations generate enormous quantities of waste. Current strategies of shrimp waste management and the current utilization strategies suffer from several disadvantages, especially from being not environmentally friendly. This warrants alternate methods to completely utilize shrimp waste. Previously, we have shown that microwave hydrothermal carbonization (MHTC) can be used to treat shrimp waste to produce hydrochar. In this study, conventional hydrothermal carbonization (CHTC) using a customized autoclave reactor was performed to treat shrimp waste. Upon using response surface design, it was found that at a holding temperature of 186 degrees C and a time of 120 min, a maximal hydrochar yield of similar to 29% was achieved. Furthermore, characterization results of elemental, proximate, energy, and surface properties of CHTC shrimp waste hydrochar were found to be comparable to that of the MHTC hydrochar from shrimp waste. In addition, the hydrochar properties were comparable to those produced from other wastes such as low-grade lignocellulosic waste and mixed wastes. This study further confirms that nonlignocellulosic wastes such as shrimp waste could be used as a biomass to produce hydrochar by HTC irrespective of the heating medium used.