Characterization of Generated Voltage, Current, Power and Power Density from Cow Dung Using Double Chambered Microbial Fuel Cell

Abstract

The present work deals with the fabrication of a laboratory scale double chambered microbial fuel cell (MFC) to generate electricity from cow dung. The experiment was performed to generate electricity from locally available cow dung as substrate using the fabricated MFC. The device was operated at anaerobic condition at varying time duration of 6 days, PVC pipe was used to make a salt bridge using agarose. The experimental readings were recorded at an interval of 1 hour. The performance was evaluated by characterizing the generated voltage, current, power and power surface density. It was observed that despite of high impedance of the substrate, all the general parameters have shown maximum values at day 5 and then a decline in trend was observed on 6 days onwards. The corresponding maximum values of the generated parameters are 0.825 V, 0.0113 µA, 0.009223 µW and 0.000000947 mW/m2 . The obtained graphs of voltage, current, power and power density were also found to have similar pattern. Thus, this study has demonstrated such that the fabricated MFC can be used for electrical energy generation from cow dung and other biowaste.