title: Assembly of coupled redox fuel cells using copper as electron acceptors to generate power and its in-situ retrieval.
abstract: Energy extraction from waste has attracted much interest nowadays. Herein, a coupled redox fuel cell (CRFC) device using heavy metals, such as copper, as an electron acceptor is assembled to testify the recoveries of both electricity and the precious metal without energy consumption. In this study, a NaBH4-Cu(II) CRFC was employed as an example to retrieve copper from a dilute solution with self-electricity production. The properties of the CRFC have been characterized, and the open circuit voltage was 1.65 V with a maximum power density of 7.2 W m(-2) at an initial Cu(2+) concentration of 1,600 mg L(-1) in the catholyte. 99.9% of the 400 mg L(-1) copper was harvested after operation for 24 h, and the product formed on the cathode was identified as elemental copper. The CRFC demonstrated that useful chemicals were recovered and the electricity contained in the chemicals was produced in a self-powered retrieval process.
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Engineering, Laboratory of Electrochemistry and Energy Storage, State Key Laboratory Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.|Institute of Environmental Engineering, East China Jiao Tong University, Nanchang, 330013, China.|State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, School of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
authors.forename: Hui-Min
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Engineering, Laboratory of Electrochemistry and Energy Storage, State Key Laboratory Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Engineering, Laboratory of Electrochemistry and Energy Storage, State Key Laboratory Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
authors.forename: Gang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Institute of Environmental Engineering, East China Jiao Tong University, Nanchang, 330013, China.
authors.forename: Zhan-Meng
authors.initials: ZM
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Engineering, Laboratory of Electrochemistry and Energy Storage, State Key Laboratory Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
authors.forename: Zu-Cheng
authors.initials: ZC
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, School of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
authors.forename: Bo-Geng
authors.initials: BG
authors.lastname: Li