Study of Arrowroot Starch‐Based Polymer Electrolytes and Its Application in MFC

Abstract

Microbial fuel cell (MFC), a biochemical‐catalyzed system which generates electricity by oxidizing biodegradable organic matter in the presence of either fermentative bacteria or enzymes, is a growing technology for electricity generation. It is a dual functioning technology which not only generates electricity but also treats wastewater, thereby addressing two major problems of the present world. As the technology is an emerging one, there are numerous challenges to be confronted. One of the vital components of the MFC is the proton exchange membrane (PEM), and it is due to the high cost of this membrane that MFC technology is still running at laboratory scale. In the present study, a starch‐based electrolyte film is used as PEM. Electrochemical behavior exhibited by the starch electrolyte is studied and on using it as PEM in MFC it is found to exhibit power density of ≈16 mW m−2 and the current density of ≈85 mA m−2. One of the main advantages of the material is its cost which is approximately INR ≈940 per square foot compared to INR 70 000 per square foot of Nafion (the most popular membrane).

Recent Progression and Opportunities of Polysaccharide Assisted Bio-Electrolyte Membranes for Rechargeable Charge Storage and Conversion Devices

“…Recently, a CA-based proton conducting membrane has been tested for PEMFC operation and shows the current and power density of 72 mA/cm 2 and 12 mw/cm 2 , respectively, studied by Monisha et al [78]. On the other hand, Tiwari et al [151,152] studied the effect of salt, solvent, and thickness of the starch membrane on microbial fuel cell applications. The single-channel microbial fuel cell has been constructed using different varieties of prepared membranes.…”

Exploring the Possibility of Starch‐Based Electrolyte Membrane in MFC Application

“…Starch‐based electrolytes are sensitive to salt concentration and the solvent used for their preparation. The effect of salt concentration on the performance of MFC has been reported in our previous publication, hence the present work aims to understand the effect of solvent, absence of salt in membrane on MFC performance, and the role of the thickness of membrane has also been studied.…”

“…In a biotic (or microbial) fuel cell (MFC), the cost of fuel is nothing instead it has many secondary benefits also, as it uses wastewater as fuel and simultaneously treats it also. The key idea of MFC functioning is the respiration of microbes present in the wastewater . During the process, oxidation of organic matter occurs in which electrons and protons are liberated where electron goes in the external circuit and proton passes through membrane and electricity is generated .…”

Evaluation of power generation and treatment efficiency of dairy wastewater in microbial fuel cell using TiO2 – SPEEK as proton exchange membrane

“…Apart from generating power, microbial fuel cells proved to have the potential to simultaneously treat the wastewater by utilizing the chemical energy present in them. Thus microbial fuel cells performs two activity (power generation and wastewater treatment) at instance which is most demanded for the current environmental situation (Santoro et al 2017;Tiwari et al 2019).…”