Hydrogen gas production from waste paper by sequential dark fermentation and electrohydrolysis

Waste paper was evaluated for hydrogen gas production by sequential dark fermentation and electrohydrolysis. Acid hydrolysed waste paper towel hydrolysate was first subjected to dark fermentation to determine the most suitable initial biomass concentration. The effects of initial biomass concentration was investigated at constant substrate concentration by varying the biomass concentration between 0 and 6 g/L and the most suitable hydrogen production was obtained at 0.10 g/L. Then effects of initial substrate concentration was investigated at 0.10 g/L initial biomass concentration by varying the glucose concentration between 5 and 40 g/L. 21.33 g glucose/L resulted in the highest hydrogen formation yield and rate in the second set of experiments. When the effluent of dark fermentation operated at optimum initial biomass and substrate concentration was subjected to electrohydrolysis the overall hydrogen production of the sequential process was 30.12 mL H2/mL. © 2015 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC