Use of chemometric techniques to identify sources of biogases

Abstract

Cluster and principal component analysis have been used to differentiate the sources of biogas production. The chemical concentrations of five component gases, carbon dioxide, methane, ethane, propane and butane, determined by gas chromatography, were analysed for samples of biogas collected from two different sources in the Strathclyde region of Scotland over a period of 12 months. The data was interpreted on the basis of three principal components which accounted for 91.6% of the variance in the system. Two factors were attributed to landfill and coal gas, whilst the third suggested peat as a possible variable in the data set.