The first-of-its-kind MFC demonstrator was revealed at Collaboration Nation, the UK government’s technology strategy board’s exemplar project day in Leeds on 2 March, having received funding from the body.
It has been developed by The University of Nottingham, produced by Lindhurst Engineering and successfully trialled at The University of Nottingham’s Sutton Bonnington Dairy Farm site, which is a member of Arla Foods Milk Partnership.
Arla Foods also supplied dairy by-products, some equipment and assisted in the design of the MFC.
The one cubic metre capacity pilot plant not only converts farm slurry and dairy waste into electricity, it also produces hydrogen gas which creates further renewable energy. A larger production scale sized cell has been calculated to be able to either supply a farm with all its annual energy needs if fed with slurry from 200 cows or provide 10% of a large dairy’s annual energy requirement if fed by-products from a large dairy processing site. Neither use would require the need for any additives.
“The trial delivered exactly what we anticipated,” said Richard Laxton, Arla’s sustainability manager. “It proved the integrity of the cutting-edge technology which has been developed and which is now poised to become a commercial reality.”
Source: Arla Foods UK
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