Production of Electricity during Wastewater Treatment Using a.pdfVIP

Environ. Sci. Technol. 2004, 38, Production of Electricity during but these technologies are generally only suitable for high- strength wastewater streams typically produced by industry. Wastewater Treatment Using a In addition, conventional anaerobic treatment produces methane gas, which if released, can contribute to global Single Chamber Microbial Fuel Cell warming. One method has been advocated to reduce wastewater treatment costs, finding ways to produce useful H O N G L I U , † products from wastewater treatment (2). However, effective R A M A N A T H A N R A M N A R A Y A N A N , ‡ A N D methods for generating products other than methane from B R U C E E . L O G A N * , † , § wastewater have not yet been shown to be feasible. It has been known for several years that bacteria can be Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, used to generate electricity that can be harvested in microbial Department of Chemistry, and The Penn State Hydrogen fuel cells (MFCs) (3). In a MFC, bacteria that oxidize a Energy (H2E) Center, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania