Aeration of Livestock Manure Slurry and Lagoon Liquid for Odor Control: A Review

Odors can be generated on livestock production farms from three major sources: production facilities, wastetreatment system and land application. Aerobic treatment of animal manure slurry and lagoon liquid can be an effectivetreatment for odor control. The energy costs required for aeration, however, is a major factor that has prevented aerobictreatment from being used widely for livestock manure treatment. There are many different aeration devices and severalpossible aeration schemes and processes which can be used on livestock farms. Recent research has been focused ondeveloping more efficient aeration techniques and equipment, determining the minimum aeration requirements for odorcontrol, and developing optimum intermittent aeration schemes to obtain efficient manure decomposition and to effectnitrogen transformation and removal from the manure slurry or liquid. This article reviews the basic concepts of aerobictreatment and presents general recommendations for designing and operating various aeration systems for treatinganimal manure slurry and lagoon liquid.