I have set up a dual chambered, H-type microbial fuel cell wait a nation 117 PEM. each chamber contains 100mL of wastewater/ catholyte. I made my set up 8 days ago, and I’m not getting any current. Also, I used carbon felt as my electrodes (but the carbon felt is untreated), could this be why I’m not getting and current generation? Or is everything going normally?
It may be possible anode chamber is not enriched enough for microbes to generate electricity.
i think sometimes there is some low concentration of electroactif bacteria in the waste water, so you can do an enrechisment of microbes in the waste water, or also somtimes the waste water contain a higher quantities of some inhibitors, you should think about aphysical or chemical pretreatment. an other things you should eliminate oxygen from the anode chamber by bubbling with nitrogen . you can also add a little bit of sodium acetate the first week to the waste water in the anodic chamber. in general in MFC and EFC they needs time.
Like@Hamza @felix Kabutey and other members have mentioned earlier, the activities of the electro active bacteria in the anode chamber is very paramount for generating current. However, This is dependent on making sure the chamber remains anaerobic and conditions are favourable for the electrogenes. You should also allow enough retention time for microbes to get themselves well attached to substrate for degradation.
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