From wastewater treatment to biorefining

Abstract

Wastewater, whether it is domestic or industrial, represents a great opportunity to recover water, energy or chemicals, and nutrients. Today, wastewater treatment is energy-consuming, and does not recover the resources from the wastewater. Bioelectrochemical systems (BESs), which have recently been developed, allow for adequate harvesting of the energy or for the production of high quality chemicals. In this article, the basic principles and opportunities of BESs in the context of wastewater treatment are explained.