Electricity generation using membrane‐less microbial fuel cell powered by sludge supplemented with lignocellulosic waste

A membrane-less microbial fuel cell (ML-MFC) is an electrochemical device that incorporates microorganisms into the design in order to produce electricity through biologically catalyzed oxidation of soluble, electron-donating substrates. In this study, three lignocellulosic raw materials were added into the ML-MFC whereby the sludge acted as the pseudomembrane. All three materials were used as the substrates in ML-MFC for the production of electricity that was measured using a digital multimeter. Results showed that the ML-MFC that contained sludge supplemented with banana peel produced the highest electricity, followed by corn bran and palm oil mill effluent (POME) at 237.1 mV (23.75 mW/m2), 176.8 mV (12.65 mW/m2), and 138 mV (22.03 mW/m2) after 138 h, 192 h, and 108 h of incubation period, respectively. For the control test (sludge only), about 162.7 mV was recorded at shorter incubation period (84 h). This showed that long-term operation of the ML-MFC using these complex lignocellulosic compounds as a direct substrate for electricity generation is feasible, though their degradation is slow.