Analysis of performances and power generation of a microbial fuel cell-membrane bioreactor integrated system

Faced the obstacles of high energy consumption and membrane fouling in MBR, a MFC-MBR integrated system was established to extract energy from wastewater with simultaneous membrane fouling mitigation. The result showed that the integrated system had high effluent quality, and the removal efficiencies of COD and NH₃-N were (94.6±3.0)% and (90.9±6.9)%, respectively. The membrane fouling was significantly reduced.Comparing with an open MFC-MBR system, the operation period of MBR increased from 18 d to 36 d in the closed MFC-MBR system. Continuous and stable electricity generation, with average current density of 5.7 A/m³, was achieved. The maximum volumetric power production was 928.0 mW/m³, and cyclic voltammetry (CV) analysis illustrated good catalysis of the bio-cathode. With internal energy recovery of wastewater, the integrated system realized fouling mitigation successfully, and showed great promise for future application as well.