The key factor in High Pressure Hydrogenotrophic Denitrification: Hydrogen partial pressure

In the envisaged hydrogen economy, H2 could be an interesting alternative electron donor for the denitrification of drinking water or wastewater. The main obstacle to engineering the hydrogenotrophic denitrification process is the low solubility of H2 in water under atmospheric pressure, which limits denitrification rate and nitrogen removal efficiency. In this paper, we demonstrated a novel configuration of hydrogenotrophic denitrification, namely High Pressure Hydrogenotrophic Denitrification (HPHD). Elevated H2 partial pressure (pH2) was employed to increase dissolved H2 concentration and concomitantly enhance denitrification rate. Our results showed that the specific denitrification rate increased from 9.6 mg N/(gVSS center dot h) at 0.5 bars to 51.0 mg N/(gVSS center dot h) at 9 bars in HPHD. The denitrification effect could be retained with elevated pH2 at a low temperature. The specific denitrification rate at 3 bars and 15 degrees C was 20.5 mg N/(gVSS center dot h), approximately 1.5 times that at 1 bar and 30 degrees C, which was quite beneficial for hydrogenotrophic denitrification under cold conditions. Different from nitrite reduction, less impact was observed on nitrate reduction by low temperature, which explained high nitrite accumulation in HPHD at 15 degrees C. Overall, our investigations shed light on the role of pH2 in the promising so-lution for nitrogen removal in HPHD.