Optimization of temperature and supporting electrolyte for ammonium removal using bioelectrochemical systems

High concentrations of ammonium in drinking water can cause many diseases and environmental problems such as eutrophication. Therefore, high-performance and eco-friendly methods for purification are of great importance and must be considered. Recently, bioelectrochemical systems have been successfully applied for the removal of many pollutants from water and wastewater. In the present work, ammonium was treated using the bioelectrochemical process. The 2 effective factors of temperature and supporting electrolyte dose were optimized using response surface methodology (RSM). The optimal conditions were electrolyte dosage of 250 mg/l and temperature of 26.5 °C. Under optimized conditions, the maximum ammonia removal percentage was 99.6%. Analysis of variance indicated a reasonable correlation coefficient (R2) between the predicted and actual values. R2 (0.8913), adjusted R2 (0.8137), and coefficient of variation (8.32 %) were calculated based on statistical analysis. The results indicate that the bioelectrochemical process is the most useful and effective method for the removal of ammonium from wastewater.