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A spontaneous fuel cell to treat benzoic acid in water and generate electricity simultaneously at ambient conditions

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Abstract

A spontaneous fuel cell is developed in this paper to treat benzoic acid, a precursor of several organic pollutants found in agro-industrial effluents. The innovative concepts behind the cell design are that at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, the reactor could accelerate the removal of benzoic acid and the generation of electricity. Experiments were performed to investigate the influences of hydrogen peroxide concentration, flow rate, electrolyte concentration, and the pH value of hydrogen peroxide solution to optimize the operating parameters for the spontaneous fuel cell, while chemical oxygen demand analysis was performed to assess the extent of degradation. It was found that in the presence of benzoic acid (0.025 mol l−1), H2O2 (10 %) and a flow rate of 13.5 ml per minute, the voltage reaches a stable value of 65 mV, and the current is 100 μA during the early stage of reaction, which is slightly lower than that of some microbial fuel cells. However, the microbial fuel cell is rather problematic because of its long treatment period, inhibitory properties, and secondary pollution. These results show that the spontaneous fuel cell is promising for energy reclamation with the removal of organics and might lead to consideration of the electrochemical role in wastewater treatment.

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Acknowledgments

This research is based on work supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21277045, 21307032), the Public Welfare Project of the Ministry of Environmental Protection (201309021), the “Shu Guang” project of the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission and the Shanghai Education Development Foundation, and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Environmental Risk Assessment and Control on Chemical Process, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, 200237, People’s Republic of China

    Jing Huo, Limei Cao & Ji Yang

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  1. Jing Huo
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  2. Limei Cao
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  3. Ji Yang
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Correspondence to Ji Yang.

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Huo, J., Cao, L. & Yang, J. A spontaneous fuel cell to treat benzoic acid in water and generate electricity simultaneously at ambient conditions. Res Chem Intermed 41, 9015–9028 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11164-015-1944-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11164-015-1944-2

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