COMPARISON OF PERFORMANCE OF AN EARTHEN PLATE AND NAFION AS MEMBRANE SEPARATORS IN DUAL CHAMBER MICROBIAL FUEL CELLS

Autor: Partha Sarathi Jana, Dónal Leech, Makarand M. Ghangrekar
Přispěvatelé: Science Foundation Ireland
Rok vydání: 2018
Předmět:
Zdroj: Environmental Engineering and Management Journal. 17:451-458
ISSN: 1843-3707
1582-9596
Popis: The performance of microbial fuel cells (MFC) employing an earthen plate as a membrane separator is compared to that using Nafion 117 in an identical up-flow dual-chambered cylindrical cell configuration. The MFC configuration is of a cylindrical outer cathode chamber separated by the membrane from a concentric rectangular inner anode chamber. The fuel cells, operated under continuous mode at hydraulic retention time of 12 hr, achieved average chemical oxygen demand removal efficiency of 60% and 48%, for the Nafion and earthen plate separators, respectively. The microbial fuel cells based on the earthen plate separator generated slightly lower average (28%) and maximum (48%) power densities than Nafion separator which is likely due to the higher membrane resistance. The earthen plate separator is 99% cheaper than the Nafion membrane, showing promise as an alternate separator for application to MFC technology. Support for this research was provided by a Charles Parsons Energy Research Award through Science Foundation Ireland. peer-reviewed
Databáze: OpenAIRE