Solar powered electrolysis of wastewater: innovative portable lab for green hydrogen production and water treatment
Abstract
Electrochemical wastewater treatments show promise for nutrient removal and gas production but require further research to realize their full potential. In sectors like water treatment, in-situ applications offer significant advantages by reducing time, costs, and ensuring reliable data. This work fills these gaps by designing and developing a portable solar-integrated open-source chemical lab for water treatment. Sized and optimized with SAMA to match the hourly load in different scenarios, the prototype was shown to be a new sustainable and reliable research laboratory. A new electrolyzer setup has been developed for testing electrode materials on wastewater; testing wastewater spiked with phosphate, ammonia and magnesium achieving nutrient recovery and hydrogen production. The gas chromatographer results measured 87-96% hydrogen purity from electrode materials tested. Water testing and precipitants analysis showed up to 35% reduction in ammonia, total phosphate recovery, and up to 70% reduction in magnesium. Lowest turbidity levels (0-15 NTU) and absorbance of wastewater have been classified and predicted (>96% accuracy) through images analysis and machine learning using a novel camera-sensor.