A new fuel-cell concept, developed by an Michigan State
University researcher, will allow biodiesel plants to eliminate the creation of
hazardous wastes while removing their dependence on fossil fuel from their
production process.
The platform, which uses microbes to glean ethanol from
glycerol and has the added benefit of cleaning up the wastewater, will allow
producers to reincorporate the ethanol and the water into the fuel-making
process, said Gemma Reguera, MSU microbiologist and one of the co-authors.