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Direct electrical power generation from urine, wastes and biomass with simultaneous photodecomposition and cleaning
Masao Kaneko1, Hirohito Ueno, Keita Ohnuki
1Faculty of Science, Ibaraki University, 2-1-1 Bunkyo, Mito 310-8512, Japan. mkaneko@mx.ibaraki.ac.jp
Abstract:
Electric power was for the first time generated directly from urine, wastes, and biomass with simultaneous photodecomposition and cleaning by using a biophotofuel cell (BPFC) composed of a nanoporous TiO2 film semiconductor photoanode and an O2-reducing cathode. Human urine exhibited a PFC characteristics with J(sc) 0.086 mA cm(-2), Voc 0.56 V, and fill factor (FF) 0.50 under irradiation by a solar simulator with AM 1.5 G and 100 mW cm(-2) incident light intensity. Both the soluble and residual parts of waste paper partially solubilized by a H3PO4 aqueous solution were also photodecomposed with simultaneous electrical power generation. As trials of various biomass materials, Coca-Cola (to test colored sample), Japanese rice wine (to test alcohol aqueous solution), and grated radish (to test slurry state sample) also generated effectively electrical power during photodecomposition by a solar simulator.
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