Concentration of nitrogen as new energy source from wastewater by electrodeionization

Abstract

With the popularity of ammonia fuel cell, nitrogen-containing compounds are becoming an alternative energy sources. However, most of those nitrogen compounds, especially ammonia, are dispersed in domestic wastewater and their treatment is often energy consumption. Therefore, the nitrogen retrieval from wastewater is becoming urgently needed of development. Adopting a new five-compartment electrodeionization technology, this paper demonstrates the possibility to concentrate ammonia nitrogen in synthetic wastewater. The result indicates that the optimum current is 0.18 A in artificial domestic sewage with low concentration ammonium ions among 15 mg/L. The nitrogen concentration can be enriched for about 12 times in single stage. The removal rate of nitrogen can reach over 90% with energy consumption of 19.104 g/kW·h. It explores a feasibility of recovering the ammonia nitrogen in wastewater.