Scalable tubular membrane cathodes for microbial fuel cell applications

FUEL 131

Yi Zuo, yzz108@psu.edu, Shaoan Cheng, suc12@psu.edu, Douglas F. Call, dougcall@psu.edu, and Bruce Logan, blogan@psu.edu. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University, 217 Sackett Building, The Penn State University, University Park, PA 16802
One of the greatest challenges for using microbial fuel cells (MFCs) for wastewater treatment is creating a scalable architecture that provides large surface areas for oxygen reduction at the cathode and for bacterial growth on the anode. We demonstrate here a scalable cathode concept by showing that two tubular hydrophilic or hydrophobic filtration membranes with conductive graphite coatings and a non-precious metal catalyst (CoTMPP) can be used to produce power in an MFC. Using a high surface area graphite brush anode with two hydrophilic ultrafiltration tubular membrane cathodes placed inside the reactor (Acat,s= 93 m2/m3), the MFC produced 18 W/m3 with a high Coulombic Efficiency (CE) of 70-74 %. Further increases in power output will require the development of membrane cathodes with lower internal resistances.
 

Fuel Cell Technology: Biofuel Cells, Enzymatic and Microbial
8:25 AM-11:45 AM, Tuesday, August 21, 2007 Boston Park Plaza -- Arlington Rm, Oral

Division of Fuel Chemistry

The 234th ACS National Meeting, Boston, MA, August 19-23, 2007