Plants & Microbial Fuel Cells| Gent, Belgium
February 10th, 2011 (5:00AM - 3:30PM)
Coupure Campus, Gent University, , Coupure Links 653
Gent, Antwerp Area, Belgium, VLAAMS GEWEST 9000 BE
Topic: Energy, Renewables, Biomass
Event Type: Conference
Tags: Anaerobic Respiration, Bio Electrochemistry, Green Sustainable Energy, Living Plants, Microbial Fuel Cell, Soil & Rhizosphere Microbiology
Comments Off Living plants in microbial fuel cells (MFC’s) might be used as future large-scale Europe-wide green energy providers. Such a system can produce green electricity or bio-hydrogen in-situ for 24 hours per day without harvesting the plants. That this might become true was indicated by our first small scale proof of principle experiments describing the so called Plant Microbial Fuel Cell (Plant-MFC) in 2008. The Plant-MFC platfrom aims to transform solar radiation into green electricity or bio-hydrogen in a clean and efficient manner. In the Plant-MFC concept, living plants and living microbes form an electrochemical system that is capable of sustainable production of usable energy from solar energy. The technology might be implemented in several ways, ranging from local small scale electricity providers to large scale energy wetlands & islands, high-tech energy & food supplying greenhouses and novel bio refineries. This way, affordable bioenergy may be produced in Europe as well as in developing countries. Plant-MFCs can invisibly be integrated in landscapes which makes this technology socially highly acceptable.
This symposium focuses at knowledge exchange along four main lines that are studied in the context of the Plant-MFC; 1) Plant health, vigour and exudation processes in (waterlogged rhizosphere &) MFC conditions. 2) Rhizosphere and MFC molecular & microbiology with focus on microbial interactions with plants and electrodes. 3) Technical aspects of the microbial fuel cell such as material science, design and configuration and electrochemical characterization of the whole system. 4) Implementation and impact this new technology.
URL: http://www.plantpower.eu
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