IBE's Bioelectrochemical Reactor (BER)

About 15342 tonnes of plastic waste is generated in India which mostly goes into the land files and piles. When the landfills reach the threshold it causes incineration or pyrolsis. Incineration releases harmful gases like dioxin. Pyrolysis of plastic wastes occurs where heavy metals and dioxins become concentrated in the resulting products making them unsuitable as fuels because when combusted they are released to the environment. To find a solution to this we have come up with a novel concept to convert plastic into ethylene glycol and TPA by Bioelectrochemical Reactor (BER). The reactor carries enhanced degradation of PET into 2 - hydroxy terephthalic acid (MHE), a heterodimer of terephthalic acid (TPA) and ethylene glycol. In this reactor Hydrolyse ester bonds with enhanced enantiospecificity and the release rate of enzymes such as PETase and MHETase increases. Some of the advantages of the product are:

• Electrochemical perturbations of the bacterium to release the enzyme at a higher rate 
• Control over the experimental conditions to control the formation of Ethylene glycol and Terephthalic acid 
• Inhibit the absorption of ethylene glycol and TPA by bacteria via electrical impulses on the electrode
• Hours to days to degrade the tonnes of plastic waste generated every day
• Environmental friendly, no harmful pollutants, complete conversion of plastics to value-added products
• The fabricated MFCs are not only efficient in plastic reduction into ethylene glycol and TPA, but it also helps in the reduction of the heavy metal pollutants present in the plastic waste and complies with 3R (Renewable, Recycle and Reuse).

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InventusBioEnergyPrivate Limited (IBE™) is established on 11th May 2020. IBE™ is a unique startup that intends to function via interdisciplinary, innovative, cost-effective research and design for product development. IBE™ prefers to work in supporting the National mission projects like (i) Solar energy, (ii) E-mobility, (iii) Information and Communication Technology for Health care through research and product development. In total, IBE™ would cater to the renewable energy needs of India such as Hydrogen economy, Energy storage solutions, Electric vehicles so on, and so forth. Also, IBE™ intends to offer consultancy services for Industries and Academia via collaborative projects and problem-oriented solutions in energy generation and storage

IBETM represents distinctive expertise in engineering and science, and that generates research to best fulfill the current and emerging needs of society, enhancing its prosperity through environmentally sustainable means. Founded in May 2020, IBETM functions through five verticals of interdisciplinary research, delivering to society at large. The FIVE verticals established are (i) Plastic recycling by bioelectrochemical reactors, (ii) waste to useful energy, (iii) Lithium-ion battery solutions, (iv) Health Care products, and (v) consultancy services to industry and academia.

As the waste generation is humongous in the country, any organic and plastic waste generated can be converted to useful products by the bioelectrochemical reactors at the point of collection. Hence mobile waste recycling units can be installed in a lot of areas to convert the waste into useful products. The waste need not be segregated and can be used as a source for the generation of useful products by bioelectrochemical reactors. This will help the largest communication network like railways and other platforms to mitigate their waste at the point of generation thereby reducing the collection, predigestion, and pretreatment of the wastes generated.