Researchers Use Beer Waste to Make Batteries

Beer and batteries aren’t two things you’d consider in a symbiotic relationship. But new research from the University of Colorado in Boulder has developed a new bio-manufacturing process that can essentially turn a brewery’s wastewater into a fungal pool for growing the “most efficient naturally-derived lithium-ion battery electrodes.”

This is basically a win-win for breweries and battery makers. One the one hand, breweries don’t have to deal with the costly process of filtering wastewater before disposing. Meanwhile, battery makers acquire the raw materials needed for making fuel cells.

The researchers have already partnered with Avery Brewing in Boulder for larger testing, and Tyler Huggins, a graduate student who worked on the project, says the method can scale easily because everything required already exists.