Synchronously degradation of biogas slurry and triphenyltin chloride in microbial fuel cell

As a novel electrochemical apparatus for synchronous electricity generation and decontamination, microbial fuel cell (MFC) provides a way to effectively deal with the refractory pollutant. A new method of electricity production by anodic biogas slurry coupling with cathodic triphenyltin chloride degradation was proposed based on the cathodic “Fenton” reaction in a typical dual-chamber MFC. The results showed that the maximum voltage was 50.32% higher and the stable time of the voltage was 2 times longer after biofilms domestication. In the end of the operation, the removal efficiency of COD, Total N and Total P of the biogas slurry were 85.35%±1.53%, 59.20%±5.24% and 44.98%±3.57%, respectively. Besides, the triphenyltin chloride (TPTC) degradation efficiency decreased with increasing initial concentration. In addition, when 100 µmol·L^-1 TPTC was added to the cathodic chamber, the highest output voltage and the maximum power density of the MFC arrived at 280.2 mV and 145.62 mW·m^-2, respectively. TPTC was removed after 14 d with the degradation of 91.88% and a rate of about 0.273 μmol·L^-1·h^-1. This study provided the foundational supports for simultaneously decomposing anodic organic effluent and cathodic organic pollution by MFC.