Agricultural and industrial activities in Malaysia have adversely impacted environmental quality leading local researchers to mobilize their expertise and resources to protect the environment from this alarming situation. The palm oil industry, for instance, generates an abundance of wastes (such as palm oil mill effluent [POME]), which calls for effective technological tools to reduce these recalcitrant wastes from spreading further. Microbial fuel cell (MFC) is an emerging technology for wastewater treatment and electricity generation simultaneously, which appears to be the most advantageous solution for these environmental concerns. This chapter reviews the prospects of MFC research with a special emphasis on the current MFC status in Malaysia. It begins with an overview of MFC principles, electron transfer mechanisms, and bio-electrochemical performance. Following that, a review of the recent MFC developments and activities by Malaysian researchers is discussed with an emphasis on POME utilization. This chapter concludes with several resolutions to the main challenges researchers and scientists are facing regarding the scalability of MFC for electricity recovery and wastewater treatment.
