The microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology offers sustainable solutions for distributed power systems and energy positive wastewater treatment, but the generation of practically usable power from MFCs remains a major challenge for system scale up and application. Commonly used external resistors will not harvest any usable energy, so energy-harvesting circuits are needed for real world applications. This review summarizes, explains, and discusses the different energy harvesting methods, components, and systems that can extract and condition the MFC energy for direct utilization. This study aims to assist environmental scientists and engineers to gain fundamental understandings of these electronic systems and algorithms, and it also offers research directions and insights on how to overcome the barriers, so the technology can be further advanced and applied in larger scale.

Microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology offers a sustainable approach to harvest electricity from biodegradable materials. Energy production from MFCs has been demonstrated using external resistors or charge pumps, but such methods can only dissipate energy through heat or receive electrons passively from the MFC without any controllability. This study developed a new approach and system that can actively extract energy from MFC reactors at any operating point without using any resistors, especially at the peak power point to maximize energy production. Results show that power harvesting from a recirculating-flow MFC can be well maintained by the maximum power point circuit (MPPC) at its peak power point, while a charge pump was not able to change operating point due to current limitation. Within 18-h test, the energy gained from the MPPC was 76.8 J, 76 times higher than the charge pump (1.0 J) that was commonly used in MFC studies. Both conditions resulted in similar organic removal, but the Coulombic efficiency obtained from the MPPC was 21 times higher than that of the charge pump. Different numbers of capacitors could be used in the MPPC for various energy storage requirements and power supply, and the energy conversion efficiency of the MPPC was further characterized to identify key factors for system improvement. This active energy harvesting approach provides a new perspective for energy harvesting that can maximize MFC energy generation and system controllability.

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