renewable energy article

[sgcsalsero]

Ok, I needed a chuckle and came across while working.

http://www.cvps.com/cowpower/

 

[JustWood]

We have a 500 cow dairy down the road that is doing this. Electric co wouldn't pay didly squat for excess electric or the hookup or maintenance so a small industrial park is developing around the farm with business' that rely heavily on electric. A win - win for everyone except the greedy electric co.

 

[sgcsalsero]

I was actually was 1st looking for information on the utility co. (http://www.cvps.com/) . . given more and more consumer interest in energy policies I would think people will eventually seek out these well meaning companies & cooperatives

 

[Gooserider]

Neat idea, but I wonder if it would be possible to do something like this with a municipal sewer system - It would seem like a worthwhile thing to do if it were feasible, as my understanding is that the current technology is very energy intensive and expensive, and there are a LOT of municipal sewage plants...

Gooserider

 

[Telco]

Should be possible as they have to do something with the solid waste.

A different direction here, I'd like to see all large cities start using a garbage powered generator to get rid of landfills. These little gems will take anything in and turn it into glass, electricity and fuel.

From the article:

"The entire thing takes up about as much space as a two-car garage, surprisingly compact for a machine that can consume nearly any type of waste—from dirty diapers to chemical weapons—by annihilating toxic materials in a process as old as the universe itself."

"The only by-products are an obsidian-like glass used as a raw material for numerous applications, including bathroom tiles and high-strength asphalt, and a synthesis gas, or “syngas”—a mixture of primarily hydrogen and carbon monoxide that can be converted into a variety of marketable fuels, including ethanol, natural gas and hydrogen."

 

[Gooserider]

Should be possible as they have to do something with the solid waste.

A different direction here, I'd like to see all large cities start using a garbage powered generator to get rid of landfills. These little gems will take anything in and turn it into glass, electricity and fuel.

From the article:

"The entire thing takes up about as much space as a two-car garage, surprisingly compact for a machine that can consume nearly any type of waste—from dirty diapers to chemical weapons—by annihilating toxic materials in a process as old as the universe itself."

"The only by-products are an obsidian-like glass used as a raw material for numerous applications, including bathroom tiles and high-strength asphalt, and a synthesis gas, or “syngas”—a mixture of primarily hydrogen and carbon monoxide that can be converted into a variety of marketable fuels, including ethanol, natural gas and hydrogen."

Interesting as a long term thing, but it doesn't sound like anyone has an actual production model in operation, and I would wonder how the system would scale.

One of the things that concerns me is the idea of needing to shred the garbage before putting it into the arc - quite aside from being a rather energy intensive process, I'd wonder about what happens to the shredder when someone tosses a heavy / dense object - perhaps trying to sneak out something in the municpal collection that would otherwise cost to get rid of - wouldn't take breaking a multi-million dollar shredding machine many times before the operation ceases to be profitable...

Another question that might or might not be relevant is what is the potential for recovering various inorganics from the left over debris - i.e. recycling out the iron, aluminum, and other metals that could be used for feedstocks?

Definitely sounds like a project that is worth exploring further, but I don't know if it is something that would actually be workable in a production garbage stream - hopefully someone will actually build a functional plant and we can see what it does with "live" trash...

Gooserider

 

[MainePellethead]

Love the article! amazing what can happen with people "thinking" and doing stuff outside of the box so to speak. Who knows what we'll be burning 20 years down the road etc. Great article.

 

[renewablejohn]

You can get shredders nowadays to shred virtually anything. we use a shredder instead of a chipper as it will handle nails bolts screws etc and with the addition of a magnet the amount of metal clinker has been reduced dramatically.

I always wonder were the catch is when somebody has been developing something as good as this for twenty years and it has not taken off. Might be asking to much for patents or cost to much to scale up.

 

[Gooserider]

You can get shredders nowadays to shred virtually anything. we use a shredder instead of a chipper as it will handle nails bolts screws etc and with the addition of a magnet the amount of metal clinker has been reduced dramatically.

I always wonder were the catch is when somebody has been developing something as good as this for twenty years and it has not taken off. Might be asking to much for patents or cost to much to scale up.

Yes and no... IF you know the general sort of thing you'll be shredding, it is easily possible, especially if you have a fairly narrow range of materials. The problem comes when you have a wide range of stuff like you will get in a municipal garbage stream - the challenge is to get something that can handle both the light weight paper goods and the solid chunk of steel - such as the crankshaft on the dead lawnmower engine that somebody snuck into the bag... Throw in the tough stringy items as well - that Tyvek paper suit for the home painter for instance... Repeat for other such problem items... No problem designing a machine that can deal with any one of them, but big problem designing one that can deal with ALL the items, and doing so in a way that can cope with high volume, and at an affordable cost for both operating and maintainance while doing so....

I suspect the shredding problem might actually be the big barrier to this and some of the other trash decomposition approaches as to the reason they haven't taken off.

Gooserider

 

[JustWood]

Most waste that is incinerated goes through a sorting line first to remove large objects that would damage a grinder or shredder . Hey Goose if you have doubts about what a shredder can do check out (broken link removed) and click on watch it shred, you'll be amazed.

 

[Redox]

Most waste that is incinerated goes through a sorting line first to remove large objects that would damage a grinder or shredder . Hey Goose if you have doubts about what a shredder can do check out (broken link removed) and click on watch it shred, you'll be amazed.

These guys have a sense of humor, too! Click on "Hippie Bug"! It's pretty funny!!

 

[Gooserider]

Most waste that is incinerated goes through a sorting line first to remove large objects that would damage a grinder or shredder . Hey Goose if you have doubts about what a shredder can do check out (broken link removed) and click on watch it shred, you'll be amazed.

These guys have a sense of humor, too! Click on "Hippie Bug"! It's pretty funny!!

Minor giggle... Not as challenging of a shred, but the "Pumpkins" one is pretty funny as well, though I don't believe the "output"...

Gooserider