New Device Harnesses Sun and Sewage to Produce Hydrogen Fuel

[Crisp]

New Device Harnesses Sun and Sewage to Produce Hydrogen Fuel

 

A novel device that uses only sunlight and wastewater to produce hydrogen gas could provide a sustainable energy source while improving the efficiency of wastewater treatment.

 

The new hybrid solar-microbial device is self-driven and self-sustained, because the combined energy from the organic matter (harvested by the MFC) and sunlight (captured by the PEC) is sufficient to drive electrolysis of water. (Credit: Image courtesy of University of California - Santa Cruz)

 

A research team led by Yat Li, associate professor of chemistry at the University of California, Santa Cruz, developed the solar-microbial device and reported their results in a paper published in the American Chemical Society journal ACS Nano. The hybrid device combines a microbial fuel cell (MFC) and a type of solar cell called a photoelectrochemical cell (PEC). In the MFC component, bacteria degrade organic matter in the wastewater, generating electricity in the process. The biologically generated electricity is delivered to the PEC component to assist the solar-powered splitting of water (electrolysis) that generates hydrogen and oxygen.

Either a PEC or MFC device can be used alone to produce hydrogen gas. Both, however, require a small additional voltage (an "external bias") to overcome the thermodynamic energy barrier for proton reduction into hydrogen gas. The need to incorporate an additional electric power element adds significantly to the cost and complication of these types of energy conversion devices, especially at large scales. In comparison, Li's hybrid solar-microbial device is self-driven and self-sustained, because the combined energy from the organic matter (harvested by the MFC) and sunlight (captured by the PEC) is sufficient to drive electrolysis of water.

In effect, the MFC component can be regarded as a self-sustained "bio-battery" that provides extra voltage and energy to the PEC for hydrogen gas generation. "The only energy sources are wastewater and sunlight," Li said. "The successful demonstration of such a self-biased, sustainable microbial device for hydrogen generation could provide a new solution that can simultaneously address the need for wastewater treatment and the increasing demand for clean energy."

 

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[Beittil]

So basically, you can flush your toiletwater into this thing and it makes your lights go on? :P

[ramesees]

Sounds really cool - lets hope we see it put into large scale production :)

 

Or the oil companies will buy it up and it will never see the light of day (pun intended).

[DocM]

There's a more direct method: engineered bacteria that directly produce hydrogen without the losses incurred by electrolysis or the need for sun (so they work 24/7.)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/21261829/

Ditto for methane, alcohol or whatever. There are also biological fuel cells that produce electricity

http://www.biologicalfuelcells.org.uk