DESIGN STUDY OF MICROBIAL FUEL CELL USING PALM OIL MILL EFFLUENT AS A SUBSTRATE

Research on the use of wastewater as a source of energy had been done to investigate the potential to produce electricity. The objectives of this project are to conduct electrochemical performance assessment of microbial fuel cell by different types of membranes. The research can be divided into two experiments. Experiment 1 was dealing with the design and fabrication of a MFC system that use Nafion 117 membrane. Meanwhile for experiment 2 was dealing with the design and fabrication of a MFC system that use SPEEK membrane. The characteristics of voltage and current generation as well as other wastewater parameters were also determined. The source of wastewater used was anaerobic sludge palm oil mill effluent (POME) from Bau Palm Oilm Mill Sdn. Bhd. (BAPOM). The maximum voltage attained was 14.6 mV with the current in the value of about 7.7 μA by using Nafion 117 membrane. In addition, the maximum voltage attained by using SPEEK membrane was 7.9 mV with the current in the value of about 2.8 μA. The samples of the POME effluent, for both before and after the mentioned processes, were tested on COD parameters. The test results show relatively high reduction in both parameters of COD which are 70.2% reduction for Nafion 117 membrane and 52.6% reduction for SPEEK membrane