In the present study, thermo-chemical pre-treatment was adopted to evaluate methane production
potential from corn stover by co-digesting it with anaerobic activated sludge. Three chemicals H2O2,
Ca(OH)2and NaOH were selected with two levels of concentration. All thermo-chemical pre-treatments
were found significant (P< 0.05) to enhance lignocellulosic digestibility and methane production. The
results indicated that the methane yield by H2O2-1, H2O2-2, and NaOH-2 treated corn stover were
293.52, 310.50 and 279.42 ml/g.VS which were 57.18%, 66.27% and 49.63% higher than the untreated corn
stover respectively. In the previous studies pre-treatment time was reported in days but our method
had reduced it to about one hour. H2O2-2 and NaOH-2 treatments remained prominent to increase
lignocellulosic degradation vigorously up to 45% and 42% respectively. Process biochemistry during the
anaerobic digestion process was taken into consideration to optimize the most feasible thermo-chemical
pre-treatment for corn stover.