scholarly journals MICROBIAL FUEL CELL (MFC) IN TREATING SPENT CAUSTIC WASTEWATER

2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-25
Author(s):  
Norsafiah Fazli ◽  
Noor Sabrina Ahmad Mutamim ◽  
Mohd Faizal Ali

Some of the major problems encountered by the world are water pollution and natural resources depletion. One of the major factors which contribute to water pollution is insufficiently treated wastewater whereas the depletion of natural resources is due to the dependability of the fossil fuel as the main energy source. Both of these issues show the world urgently required an effective technology of wastewater treatment and energyrecovery. Microbial Fuel Cell (MFC) is a treatment method that can achieve the needs of effective treatment of wastewater and energy recovery simultaneously. As mentioned, insufficiently treated wastewater is one of the main causes which contributes to water pollution. Spent caustic wastewater is one of the industrial wastewater that is difficult to be treated, handled and disposed due to its noxious properties. Existing treatment method of treating spent caustic wastewater are limited by low efficiency. However, by applying MFCs, organic and inorganic contaminants are oxidized by biomass and produce electron that is transferred to electrode. The movement of the electron from anode to cathode generate electricity and turns MFC into a treatment method that able to provide both wastewater treatment and energy production. This article presents a review of spent caustic wastewater and its existing treatment method as well as the MFC researches in terms of its configuration and factors affecting its performance

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aman Dongre ◽  
Monika Sogani ◽  
Kumar Sonu ◽  
Zainab Syed ◽  
Gopesh Sharma

Pollution caused by chemical and dairy effluent is a major concern worldwide. Dairy wastewaters are the most challenging to treat because of the presence of various pollutants in them. The characteristics of effluent like temperature, color, pH, Dissolved Oxygen, Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), dissolved solids, suspended solids, chloride, sulfate, oil, and grease depend solely on the volume of milk processed and the form of finished produce. It is difficult to select an efficient wastewater treatment method for the dairy wastewaters because of their selective nature in terms of pH, flow rate, volume, and suspended solids. Thus there exists a clear need for a technology or a combination of technologies that would efficiently treat the dairy wastewaters. This chapter explains the energy-generating microbial fuel cell or MFC technologies for dairy wastewaters treatment having different designs of MFCs, mechanism of action, different electrode materials, their surface modification, operational parameters, applications and outcomes delivered through the technology in reducing the COD, BOD, suspended solids and other residues present in the wastewaters. The chapter also elaborates on the availability of various natural low-cost anode materials which can be derived from agricultural wastes. The current chapter elaborates on MFC technology and its tools used for dairy wastewater treatment, providing useful insight for integrating it with existing conventional wastewater treatment methods to achieve the degradation of various dairy pollutants including emerging micropollutants.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Md. Abdul Halim ◽  
Md. Owaleur Rahman ◽  
Mohammad Ibrahim ◽  
Rituparna Kundu ◽  
Biplob Kumar Biswas

Finding sustainable alternative energy resources and treating wastewater are the two most important issues that need to be solved. Microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology has demonstrated a tremendous potential in bioelectricity generation with wastewater treatment. Since wastewater can be used as a source of electrolyte for the MFC, the salient point of this study was to investigate the effect of pH on bioelectricity production using various biomass feed (wastewater and river water) as the anolyte in a dual-chambered MFC. Maximum extents of power density (1459.02 mW·m−2), current density (1288.9 mA·m−2), and voltage (1132 mV) were obtained at pH 8 by using Bhairab river water as a feedstock in the MFC. A substantial extent of chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal (94%) as well as coulombic efficiency (41.7%) was also achieved in the same chamber at pH 8. The overall performance of the MFC, in terms of bioelectricity generation, COD removal, and coulombic efficiency, indicates a plausible utilization of the MFC for wastewater treatment as well as bioelectricity production.


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