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

• H2 production from acid hydrolysed waste paper towel (WPT) was investigated.
• WPT was subjected to sequential dark fermentation (DF) and electrohydrolysis (EH).
• Initial biomass and glucose concentrations significantly affected H2 formation in DF.
• The EH process resulted in almost pure H2 production.

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.