Maritza Sanchez

Cuautlancingo, Puebla, Mexico

Turning waste into energy

More About Maritza

As a high-schooler in the central Mexican town of Cuautlancingo, Maritza Sanchez could not escape the evidence of environmental pollution all around her. Walking home from school, she would frequently encounter trash — used tires, old TVs, broken circuit boards — discarded along the road. Many days, she could smell stench emanating the nearby Atoyac River, which was heavily contaminated with sewage, industrial effluents, and agricultural runoff.

Then, through an applied chemistry competition, Sanchez learned about microbial fuel cells: an alternative energy source that uses bacteria to break down organic pollutants in water, and in the process, generates electricity. It sparked an idea — microbial fuel cells that could utilize materials from local waste as well as contaminated water from the Atoyac River. The benefits would be threefold: electricity for energy-poor households, cleaner river water, and reuse of discarded trash.

She ran with it, developing the concept while still in high-school and eventually founding Aquayac Energy in 2025 while in college. As lead of technical development for the nonprofit, Sanchez designs, constructs, and tests microbial fuel cell prototypes using recycled materials like plastic and metal; tests water quality after treatment; and measures energy generation at a lab in New Haven, Connecticut, where she’s currently pursuing her undergraduate degree in chemistry. Sanchez also leads community engagement efforts both online and in Cuautlancingo, including at her former high school. While she’s still refining the fuel cell design, she expects to scale the project over the coming year and produce 50 functional fuel cells by 2027.