Monitoring Volatile Fatty Acids in an Anaerobic Process with Microbial Fuel Cell

Abstract

Volatile fatty acids (VFAs) concentration is a good indicator to control and optimize the anaerobic digestion process. Though VFA concentration is a high sensitive parameter, most of the methods of measuring it are complex and require time. Therefore this study is to find out a reliable, quick method to monitor VFA concentration in the process. In this study, a microbial fuel cell (MFC) was developed using synthetic samples of VFA. As the first part of the study, the correlation between voltage and the acetic acid concentration in the anaerobic digestion process was developed using developed MFC. Microbes to digest the acetic acid were grown in the coir brush. That coir brush was used as a bio film in the MFC. The salt bridge, which is made using 1 M KCl and agar was used as a proton exchange membrane in the MFC. The relationship was observed between voltage and acetic acid concentration with acetic acid level from 0.09 M to 0.01 M.