Microbial fuel cell with high content solid wastes as substrates: a review

Abstract

Fundamentals and configuration design of MFCs fueled by HCSW were reviewed.

HCSWs including sewage sludge, biomass and biowaste treated in MFCs were summarized.

HCSW based MFCs technologies covered the types of sediment, soil, wetland and plant.

Activated sludge process and composting could be coupled with HCSW-MFCs.

HCSW-MFCs could be applied in bioremediation and biosensing.

With the increasing concern about the serious global energy crisis and high energy consumption during high content solid wastes (HCSWs) treatment, microbial fuel cell (MFC) has been recognized as a promising resource utilization approach for HCSW stabilization with simultaneous electrical energy recovery. In contrast to the conventional HCSW stabilization processes, MFC has its unique advantages such as direct bio-energy conversion in a single step and mild reaction conditions (viz., ambient temperature, normal pressure, and neutral pH). This review mainly introduces some important aspects of electricity generation from HCSW and its stabilization in MFC, focusing on: (1) MFCs with different fundamentals and configurations designed and constructed to produce electricity from HCSW; (2) performance of wastes degradation and electricity generation; (3) prospect and deficiency posed by MFCs with HCSW as substrates. To date, the major drawback of MFCs fueled by HCSW is the lower power output than those using simple substrates. HCSW hydrolysis and decomposition would be a major tool to improve the performance of MFCs. The optimization of parameters is needed to push the progress of MFCs with HCSW as fuel.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Microbial fuel cell / High content solid wastes / Substrate / Bioremediation / Biosensor

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Acknowledgements

The authors gracefully acknowledge funding supported by the National Nature Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51378144) , and the support by State Key Laboratory of Urban Water Resource and Environment (2016DX05), Harbin Institute of Technology.

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2017 Higher Education Press and Springer–Verlag Berlin Heidelberg