Turning Wastewater Into Hydrogen Fuel

Finding a green fuel that is cheap and plentiful enough to replace fossil fuels is one of the biggest challenges that we face. This is not because of global warming issues but also because once we use up all fossil fuel there won’t be any left in the world. Since hydrogen is a good thing to replace with, we might use it in the future, but it doesn’t come naturally. And to produce it, it would take energy from “dirty” fossil fuels.

Researchers from Pennsylvania State University have devised a radical, energy-efficient way to extract unlimited amounts of hydrogen from wastewater, using seawater and, some special bacteria.

Since 2009, the team led by the Professor of Environmental Engineering, Bruce Logan, has been conducting tests with bacteria that are capable of releasing hydrogen from wastewater. Once they were able to figure out the 'right combination' of bacteria needed for the optimal extraction of hydrogen, they had to come with a 'clean' way to provide the bacteria with the energy it needed to eat through the wastewater.

After all this, they thought of a brilliant idea, reverse Desalination! They figured that since the process of removing salt from seawater takes up energy, doing the opposite would release energy. Knowing that all they had to do was find a source of seawater close to a wastewater treatment plant and hitch the two together. This should give the bacteria enough fuel to produce hydrogen.

When they tested it it turned out that they were completely correct. However, this only works in a lab, now, they must go and see if it works on larger scale, but not only that, if it makes economical sense. Let’s all hope it does because not only does it take care of our fuel needs, but also it helps us clean up our wastewater!