IIT Guwahati researcher develops device to produce green energy from waste water

The Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati (IIT-Guwahati) on Wednesday said their researchers have developed a bio-electrochemical device, Microbial Fuel Cell (MFC) that can generate green energy by treating wastewater.

The use of organic material such as wastewater in MFC makes it an eco-friendly device that offers a dual benefit of bio-electricity generation and waste management.

"They have developed a bio-electrochemical device that converts chemical energy contained in organic substrates into electrical energy through microbes," the IITG said in a statement.

The research was led by Prof. Mihir Kumar Purkait of the department of chemical engineering along with his PhD student, Mukesh Sharma. The research was supported by a grant from the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India.

The device can generate energy from various wastes, such as sewage waste and food industries wastes.

“This development has provided an excellent sustainable energy source along with treating several wastewaters. After scaling the process, it can be used as a source of clean energy using municipal wastewater and other such areas economically,” the director of IIT Guwahati, Prof T. G. Sitharam, said in the statement.

Explaining the long-term impact of the research, Prof.Purkait said, “Further implementation of this process may provide an excellent alternative to several costlier renewable energy extraction processes. The conducted study reveals that the prepared CEMs are cheaper and perform better as compared to the several reported membranes, assisting in the separation of charges and potential development.

‘MFC’ is a bio-electrochemical reactor system that utilizes electrons liberated in the biochemical oxidation of organic substrates catalyzed by anaerobic microbes, said the statement.