Brewery wastewater was converted H(2) by anaerobic sludge in batch experiments. A three-factor three-level experimental design of Box-Behnken method was adopted to find the optimum H(2) production conditions. The effects of three major influence factors, temperature, pH and brewery wastewater concentration (BWC), on H(2) yield and H(2) maximum production rate (R(max)) were evaluated by applying response surface methodology (RSM) integrating a desirability function approach. Desirable H(2) yield and R(max) simultaneously were achieved under temperature 35.9 degrees C, pH 5.95 and BWC 6.05 g/l by a desirability function approach which produced the maximum overall desirability 0.894. Correspondingly, the H(2) yield and Rmax were 149.6 ml H(2)/g COD and 53.6 ml/h, respectively. The verification test confirms that the optimum H(2) yield and R(max) measured were in good agreement with the predicted values, suggesting that the desirability function approach with RSM was a useful technique to get the maximum H(2) yield and R(max) simultaneously. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.