Valorising Nutrients from Wastewater Through MFC Hybridization with Hydroponics
摘要
Nutrient pollution is the primary cause of eutrophication, posing a threat to aquatic environments, sanitation systems and the economic growth of business sectors relying on water. Nutrients involved in eutrophication, such as nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium (NPK), can be recovered to alleviate the environmental burden of sewage discharges and used as fertilisers. Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) have emerged as a green wastewater treatment (WWT) technology for nutrient removal or recovery with simultaneous electricity generation. More recently, the hybridisation of MFC and hydroponics has shown potential to redirect nutrients from wastewater(WW) into the agricultural sector, thereby “closing the loop” of nutrient circularity. In this work, different examples of NPK filtering and recovery using MFCs are presented, along with the main types of MFC-hydroponics (MFC-H).