Scientists in the UK have successfully managed to harness hydrogen produced by bacteria to produce clean electricity through a fuel cell.

Bioscientists from the University of Birmingham used hydrogen produced by bacteria feeding off high-energy waste, such as that left over by the confectionery industry.

Nougat and caramel waste was placed in a five-litre reactor and a specific high hydrogen-generating type of bacteria was then added. The fuel cell was used to combine the hydrogen with the oxygen in the air to produce electricity.

Professor Lynne Macaskie of the University of Birmingham's School of Biosciences led the research team.

"Hydrogen offers huge potential as a carbon-free energy carrier," she said.

"Although only at its initial stages, we've demonstrated a hydrogen-producing, waste-reducing technology that, for example, might be scaled-up in five to ten years' time for industrial electricity generation and waste treatment processes."

Waste left behind from the process was then coated in palladium and used in another project that aims to discover new ways of removing pollutants from the atmosphere.

The process could offer a new use for fuel cells as well as opportunities to reuse waste produced by the confectionary industry.

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