Acceleration of Ammonium Nitrite Denitrification by Freezing: Determination of Activation Energy from the Temperature of Maximum Reaction Rate

A reaction of ammonium nitrite in ice was investigated. Upon freezing, some nitrite is oxidized by dissolved oxygen and some nitrite reacts with ammonium to produce nitrogen and water in a denitrification reaction. The former reaction was accelerated only during freezing, and the latter one was accelerated even after the whole sample was frozen. The denitrification reaction proceeded at very low concentration in ice, which were conditions under which the reaction would not proceed in solution. The nitrogen production increased linearly with increasing initial concentration of ammonium nitrite. The concentration factor in the unfrozen solution in ice was estimated to be 50.6 when the initial concentration was 0.5 mmol dm–3, as obtained from comparison of reaction rates in solution and in ice. A new method for determination of the activation energy is proposed that gives a value of 53 to 61 kJ mol–1 for denitrification. The reaction order of the denitrification process is also determined using our method, and it is concluded to follow third-order kinetics.