In the present study commercial Polylactic Acid (PLA) and Mater-Bi (MB) disposable cutlery available
on the market were selected for lab scale anaerobic degradability tests. The experiments were carried out
under thermophilic conditions at different food to microorganisms (F/M) ratios and test material size,
and the specific biogas production and associated kinetics were evaluated. PLA maximum biogas
production was comparable for almost all the experimental runs (1550-1670 Nml/gTOC) and only test
material size reduction appeared to result in higher yields. Mater-Bi items degradation was strongly
affected by product composition and resulted in lower yields. The specific methane yield ranged from 430
to 505 Nml/gVSfood for PLA runs and from 322 to 690 Nml/gVSfood for Mater-Bi runs
