Professor Claudio Avignone Rossa FRSB

Current wastewater treatment technologies are efficient at removing most organic contaminants, but consume significant amounts of energy (~1.2 kWh m^-3), which makes it an expensive process. Theoretically, the wastewater organic content is sufficient to generate approximately 4 times more energy than is required for wastewater treatment. Thus, it could be possible to minimize energy consumption through capturing part of the energy contained in organic waste streams. A nascent technology to extract energy and value- added chemicals in organic waste streams is the “microbial electrochemical cell” (MXC), a platform technology able to recover energy as electrical current and H₂, based on the ability of anode-respiring bacteria (ARB) to oxidize organic matter internally and transfer the resulting electrons to a solid electron acceptor (the anode).

We propose to couple photocatalysis and biodegradation by developing a microbial electrochemical cell (ICPB-MXC) combining visible-light-adsorbing photocatalysts and anode- respiring bacteria to accelerate the degradation of recalcitrant organic compounds while recovering electrical current and hydrogen.

The overarching goal of this collaborative project is to develop an advanced engineered platform combining chemical, visible-light- induced photocatalysis and biodegradation, to accelerate the degradation of recalcitrant organic compounds in wastewater while recovering electrical current and H₂.

GREENER is a multi-disciplinary project, involving 15 EU universities, research institutes and SMEs and 5 academic and scientific partners from China, to address the Horizon 2020 topic CE-BIOTEC-04-2018: New biotechnologies for environmental remediation. 

GREENER proposes the development of green, sustainable, efficient, and low-cost solutions for soil/sediment and water bioremediation that, by integrating several remediation strategies with innovative bio-electrochemical technologies, will effectively accelerate the remediation time of a range of organic and inorganic pollutants of high concern, while producing end-products of interests, such as bioelectricity and/or harmless metabolites of industrial interest. To achieve such an ambitious goal, organisms with high bioremediation ability will be identified and isolated, the influence of physico-chemical factors on the effectiveness of treatment will be evaluated and proof-of-concept experiments to define optimal integrated solutions at the lab-scale will be performed. Finally, a combination of the most promising technologies will be up-scaled and tested on field. Life cycle analyses will demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of the solutions suggested.

Increasing chemical pollution seriously compromises the health of ecosystems and humans worldwide. Hazardous compounds, such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, heavy metals and emerging pollutants contaminate soils/sediments, ground and surface waters. To prevent/minimise the risks associated with the accumulations of these chemicals in the environment it is key to establish low-cost/green methodologies for the treatment and redevelopment of contaminated areas. Several physico-chemical methods have been explored to remove pollutants in the environment, but these are complex, energy consuming or expensive. The exploitation of the capability of bacteria, fungi and phototrophs to transform toxic contaminants into harmless end-products, can lead instead to cheap and sustainable bioremediation alternatives. GREENER proposes the development of innovative, efficient and low-cost hybrid solutions that integrate bioremediation technologies with bio-electrochemical systems (BES). BES, such as microbial fuel cells, break down organic contaminants through the action of electroactive bacteria while generating electrical current. We will investigate the synergetic effect of different bioremediation strategies and demonstrate effective pollutants removal in water and soil/sediments, while generating side products of interest, such as bioelectricity. The type and entity of contamination, along with the specific physico-chemical/microbial characteristics of the environment to be depolluted, will feed into a decision-making toolbox. The latter will allow the establishment of ad hoc integrated solutions, which will take into account effectiveness of biodegradation, costs, environmental risks and social aspects. Fundamental research will be performed at lab-scale, while pilot-tests will be used to proof the scaling-up feasibility for field applications. Environmental benefits and risks, compared to standard remediation approaches, including energy efficiency, will be investigated.

Production of bioelectricity from organic matter has shown great potential as an opportunity to reduce the inefficient disposal and accumulation of organic waste. Despite significant advances in MFCs, further research is required to enhance their performance.

This project will focus on evaluation of bioelectrochemical performance of a native microbial community for waste degradation and energy recovery from industrial coffee waste in a low cost microbial fuel cell. With the design and construction of a low cost microbial fuel cell (MFC) useful in the treatment of agroindustrial coffee waste and the establishment of a native microbial community with high degradation capability for agroindustrial coffee waste. We intend to show great potential to reduce the inefficient disposal and accumulation of organic waste.

The intended result of the project is the development of prototype of an operational microbial fuel cell (MFC) to be used on agro industrial coffee waste. It will be built considering economic and environmental sustainability and its potential application in coffee production farms. We intend to identify a suitable microbial/microorganism strain with high degradation capability of solid-liquid residues and generation of bioelectricity. Additionally, we also intend to define the best operational conditions and performance parameters for a best degradation of these agro industrial residues while generating energy at the same time.