An Innovative Technology Platform for:

the enhanced treatment of industrial wastewaters achieving cost reductions, electricity generation and enabling water reuse for non-potable applications

The AquaCell project will advance the state-of-the-art for MFC wastewater treatment. Key innovations will include integration of photocatalytic advanced oxidation with MFC technology; cost efficient high performance fuel cell design; and innovative scale up configuration and process control strategies for specific target wastewater effluents. System features and benefits will include:

• Customisation to specific end-user (sector) requirements and functionality, enabling treatment of industrial wastewaters with variable and low to high chemical oxygen demand (COD) and/or containing hazardous non-degradable micro-pollutants;
• Wastewater treatment and re-use for on-site non-potable applications (~20% on-site water use generating ~€1.5 per m3 cost saving);
• Significant cost reductions in wastewater effluent discharge costs (>70%);
• Value recovery from wastewater effluent (waste to electricity) thereby enabling rapid capital payback in cost savings, system sustainability (self powering) and wider electricity cost savings.
• The project will result in a pilot scale system demonstrated for a target industrial wastewater effluent.