Project description
Immobilised redox mediators accelerate biomethane production
Biomethane, a biogas approximately equivalent to natural gas, can be produced in reactors by microorganisms that digest organic materials. Accelerating the methane production rate will increase the profitability of the process, and thus its economic attractiveness. With the support of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the BES.WIRE project aims to do just this. The project will use immobilised redox mediators (anthraquinone derivatives) in a bioreactor and a bioelectrochemical reactor based on a trickle-bed reactor. The reactors will use raw biogas from an industrial anaerobic digester and hydrogen from alkaline electrolysis to synthesise methane in a power-to-methane approach. Furthermore, the use of zero-gap flow electrochemical cells for the first time will accelerate the screening of promising materials.
Objective
Biomethane is a gas consisting mainly of methane (CH4) that can be produced from agricultural and food waste or other organic materials at a low or even negative price. Since biomethane is almost equivalent to natural gas, it is seen as a possible functional substitute: biomethane can be used an energy carrier for excess renewable electricity and as a feedstock for chemical synthesis. It is possible to produce biomethane by means of various biochemical and bioelectrochemical reactors in which the main role is played by methanogenic micro-organisms that convert CO2 or other organic compounds into CH4. This project is dedicated to the development of two bio(electro)chemical reactors based on a trickle-bed reactor using raw biogas from an industrial anaerobic digester and hydrogen from an alkaline electrolysis for the synthesis of CH4. The main fundamental novelty of this project is the use of immobilized redox mediators (anthraquinone derivatives), which promote the rate of methanogenesis and thus increase the performance of the whole set-up. In the case of the bioreactor, carbon particles with immobilized redox mediators are used as the biofilm support material. In the case of the bioelectrochemical reactor, the same materials also act as colloidal electrodes. This approach is expected to significantly improve key characteristics such as methane conversion rate and power density, which will enhance the economic attractiveness of the technology. Also, the project will use zero-gap flow electrochemical cells for the first time to accelerate the screening of promising materials.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
- engineering and technologyenvironmental biotechnologybioremediationbioreactors
- natural scienceschemical scienceselectrochemistryelectrolysis
- natural scienceschemical sciencesorganic chemistryaliphatic compounds
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesmicrobiology
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Keywords
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Main Programme
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European FellowshipsCoordinator
8000 Aarhus C
Denmark