Nitrogen recovery from wastewater using microbial fuel cells

Abstract

Nitrogen is one of major contaminants in wastewater; however, nitrogen, as bio-elements for crop growth, is the indispensable fertilizer in agriculture. In this study, two-chamber microbial fuel cells (MFCs) were first operated with microorganisms in anode chamber and potassium ferricyanide as catholyte. After being successfully startup, the two-chamber MFCs were re-constructed to three-chamber MFCs which were used to recover the \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}^{-}-\mathrm{N} and \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{H}}_{\mathrm{4}}^{+}-\mathrm{N} of synthetic wastewater into value-added nitrogenous fertilizer from cathode chamber and anode chamber, respectively. Ferric nitrate was used as the sole electron acceptor in cathode, which also was used to evaluate the \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}^{-}-\mathrm{N} recover efficiency in the case major anion of \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}^{-} in cathode. The output voltage of these MFCs was about 600–700 mV at an external load of 500 Ω. About 47% \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{H}}_{\mathrm{4}}^{+}-\mathrm{N} in anode chamber and 83% \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}^{-}-\mathrm{N} in cathode chamber could be recovered. Higher current density can selectively improve the recovery efficiency of both \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{H}}_{\mathrm{4}}^{+}-\mathrm{N} and \mathrm{N}{\mathrm{O}}_{\mathrm{3}}^{-}-\mathrm{N}. The study demonstrated a nitrogen recovery process from synthetic wastewater using three-chamber MFCs.

Keywords

nitrogen recovery / microbial fuel cells (MFCs) / electromigration / wastewater treatment

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