Comparison of the removal of monovalent and divalent cations in the microbial desalination cell

Abstract

Microbial desalination cell (MDC) is a promising technology to desalinate water and generate electrical power simultaneously. The objectives of this study were to investigate the desalination performance of monovalent and divalent cations in the MDC, and discuss the effect of ion characteristics, ion concentrations, and electrical characteristics. Mixed salt solutions of NaCl, MgCl₂, KCl, and CaCl₂ with the same concentration were used in the desalination chamber to study removal of cations. Results showed that in the mixed salt solutions, the electrodialysis desalination rates of cations were: Ca²⁺ >Mg²⁺>Na⁺>K⁺. Higher ionic charges and smaller hydrated ionic radii resulted in higher desalination rates of the cations, in which the ionic charge was more important than the hydrated ionic radius. Mixed solutions of NaCl and MgCl₂ with different concentrations were used in the desalination chamber to study the effect of ion concentrations. Results showed that when ion concentrations of Na⁺ were one-fifth to five times of Mg²⁺, ion concentration influenced the dialysis more profoundly than electrodialysis. With the current densities below a certain value, charge transfer efficiencies became very low and the dialysis was the main process responsible for the desalination. And the phosphate transfer from the anode chamber and potassium transfer from the cathode chamber could balance 1%–3% of the charge transfer in the MDC.

Keywords

divalent ion / electrodialysis / ion characteristic / microbial desalination cell / monovalent ion

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Acknowledgements

This work was partly supported by grants from the State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (10K04ESPCT), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51039007 and 51278500), the program of Guangzhou Science & Technology Department (No. 2012J4300115), National Key Scientific Instrument and Equipment Development Project (No. 2012YQ0301110 803), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (13lgpy55) and the innovative doctorial program of Sun Yat-sen University.

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2014 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg