Determination of Electrochemical Properties of Electrolytes from Domestic Wastewater

Abstract

The erratic power supply in Nigeria has led to a decline in economic development and a low standard of living for many people within the country. Access to Nigeria’s electricity has been low for a very long time with no improvement in sight. One of the ways of resolving this problem is the provision of a microbial fuel cell (MFC) that can power some of the devices at home. This study investigates some of the electrochemical parameters of the electrolyte in microbial fuel cells. Three identical laboratory microbial fuel cells (MFCs) were constructed with a working volume of 1000 mL for each chamber. The MFCs were constructed in an H-shaped design with both chambers separated by cation ceramic membranes (CEM). Activated carbon materials obtained from white afara tree ( Terminalia superba (TS)), bamboo tree ( Bambusa vulgaris (BV)) and carbon cloth (CC) were used as the electrodes which were dipped into the reactors as MFC-1, MFC-2 and MFC-3, respectively. The electrochemical parameters of the electrolyte were studied. The maximum potential difference being obtained from MFC-1 ( Terminalia superba (TS)) and MFC-3 (carbon cloth (CC)) occurred on day 5 which were 0.510 V and 0.95 V, respectively. The maximum potential difference obtained from MFC-2 ( Bambusa vulgaris (BV)) occurred on day 15 which was 0.2 V. The results generated in this study showed that MFC-3 (carbon cloth (CC)) performed better in terms of voltage generation. The result of MFC-1 ( Terminalia superba (TS)) showed that it performed better than MFC-2 ( Bambusa vulgaris (BV) in terms of voltage generation. The results provide further information on the possibility of using MFCs for electricity generation.