Supercapacitive microbial desalination cells: New class of power generating devices for reduction of salinity content.

Appl Energy

Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Center for Micro-Engineered Materials (CMEM), University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131, USA.

Published: December 2017

In this work, the electrodes of a microbial desalination cell (MDC) are investigated as the positive and negative electrodes of an internal supercapacitor. The resulting system has been named a supercapacitive microbial desalination cell (SC-MDC). The electrodes are self-polarized by the red-ox reactions and therefore the anode acts as a negative electrode and the cathode as a positive electrode of the internal supercapacitor. In order to overcome cathodic losses, an additional capacitive electrode (AdE) was added and short-circuited with the SC-MDC cathode (SC-MDC-AdE). A total of 7600 discharge/self-recharge cycles (equivalent to 44 h of operation) of SC-MDC-AdE with a desalination chamber filled with an aqueous solution of 30 g L NaCl are reported. The same reactor system was operated with real seawater collected from Pacific Ocean for 88 h (15,100 cycles). Maximum power generated was 1.63 ± 0.04 W m for SC-MDC and 3.01 ± 0.01 W m for SC-MDC-AdE. Solution conductivity in the desalination reactor decreased by ∼50% after 23 h and by more than 60% after 44 h. There was no observable change in the pH during cell operation. Power/current pulses were generated without an external power supply.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5738972PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.10.056DOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

microbial desalination
12
supercapacitive microbial
8
desalination cell
8
internal supercapacitor
8
desalination
5
desalination cells
4
cells class
4
class power
4
power generating
4
generating devices
4

Similar Publications

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!