URINE collected at music festivals like Glastonbury could be used to power robots, it has been claimed.

Researchers at Bristol universities are to spend four years on a half-a-million pound project looking at urine.

Dr Ioannis Ieropoulos has been awarded a £564,561 grant to develop research into how waste could be used by Microbial Fuel Cells to generate energy.

MFCs are a developing technology used to power autonomous robots, using bacterial cultures to break down "food" to create power.

One such source could be urine and there is a plentiful supply of that at your average music festival.

Bristol Robotics Lab – which includes researchers from the University of the West of England and the University of Bristol – will be helping with the research.

Dr Ieropoulos said: "Over the years we have fed our MFCs with rotten fruit, grass clippings, prawn shells and dead flies in an attempt to investigate different waste materials to use as a 'food source' for the Microbial Fuel Cells.

"We have focused on finding the best waste materials that create the most energy.

"Urine is chemically very active, rich in nitrogen and has compounds such as urea, chloride, potassium and bilirubin, which make it very good for the microbial fuel cells.

"We have already done preliminary tests which show it being a waste material that is very effective."

Researchers are already in touch with a waterless urinal company who have seen the potential of the technology.

Robots with unusual power supplies are not a first for the Bristol Robotics Lab. Researchers have spent three-and-a-half years developing EcoBot-III, a robot which can power itself by digesting waste.