Efficient removal of nitrobenzene and concomitant electricity production by single-chamber microbial fuel cells with activated carbon air-cathode

•Single chamber MFCs with AC air cathodes show high nitrobenzene tolerance.•Electricity production can be achieved using nitrobenzene-containing wastewaters.•Nitrobenzene can be efficiently removed in single-chamber MFCs.

Single-chamber microbial fuel cells (S-MFCs) with bio-anodes and activated carbon (AC) air-cathodes showed high nitrobenzene (NB) tolerance and NB removal with concomitant electricity production. The maximum power over 25 W m−3 could be obtained when S-MFCs were operated in the NB loading range of 1.2-6.2 mol m−3 d−1, and stable electricity production over 13.7 W m−3 could be produced in a NB loading range of 1.2-14.7 mol m−3 d−1. The present S-MFCs exhibited high NB removal performance with NB removal efficiency over 97% even when the NB loading rate was increased to 17.2 mol m−3 d−1. The potential NB reduced product (i.e. aniline) could also be effectively removed from influents. The findings in this study means that single-chamber MFCs assembled with pre-enriched bio-anodes and AC air-cathodes could be developed as effective bio-electrochemical systems to remove NB from wastewaters and to harvest energy instead of consuming energy.