Biogas- A cheap, renewable energy source we flush away?

[Nu Kua]

Sharing the links as I ran across them.

TIME.com article by Bryan Walsh, "Toilet Tales: Inside the World of Waste",
regarding the work of Rose George and her book,
"The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why it Matters"
Amazon.com

...Toilets are a privilege that nearly half the world lacks. At least 2.6 billion people around the planet have no access to a toilet — and that doesn't just mean that they don't have a nice, heated indoor bathroom. It means they have nothing — not a public toilet, not an outhouse, not even a bucket. They defecate in public, contaminating food and drinking water, and the disease toll due to unsanitized human waste is staggering. George notes that 80% of the world's illnesses are caused by fecal matter...

The article then goes on to explain how useful human fecal matter can be when utilized.

...In China, George meets Wang Ming Ying, a tiny woman from the rural province of Shaanxi who promotes the use of biogas — energy created from the fermentation of human waste — which can be used for electricity and cooking fires, and helps slow the deforestation ravaging her country...

Energy created from the fermentation of human waste? I've heard of it being used as fertilizer but not fuel! And the search begins...

Says WIKI:

Biogas typically refers to a gas produced by the biological breakdown of organic matter in the absence of oxygen. Biogas originates from biogenic material and is a type of biofuel.

One type of biogas is produced by anaerobic digestion or fermentation of biodegradable materials such as biomass, manure or sewage, municipal waste, green waste and energy crops...The gases methane, hydrogen and carbon monoxide can be combusted or oxidized with oxygen. Air contains 21% oxygen. This energy release allows biogas to be used as a fuel. Biogas can be used as a low-cost fuel in any country for any heating purpose, such as cooking. It can also be used in modern waste management facilities where it can be used to run any type of heat engine, to generate either mechanical or electrical power. Biogas can be compressed, much like natural gas, and used to power motor vehicles] and in the UK for example is estimated to have the potential to replace around 17% of vehicle fuel [1]. Biogas is a renewable fuel, so it qualifies for renewable energy subsidies in some parts of the world...

Institute of Science in Society Article-
Biogas China

...There’s evidence that biogas was used to heat bath water in Assyria during 10 BC; and the first digestion plant to produce biogas from wastes was built in a leper colony in Bombay India in 1859 [2] (Sustainable Food System for Sustainable Development).

China is one of countries in the world to have used biogas technology early in its history. By the end of the nineteenth century, simple biogas digesters had appeared in the coastal areas of southern China. Mr. Luo Guorui invented and built an eight cubic metre Guorui biogas tank in 1920, and established the Santou Guorui Biogas Lamp Company. In 1932, he moved the Company to Shanghai and changed his firm’s name to Chinese Guorui Biogas Company with many branches along the Yangtze River and in the southern provinces. Chinese Guorui Biogas Digester Practical Lecture Notes was published in 1935 [3], the first monograph on biogas in China and in the world. That was the first wave of biogas use in China.

The second wave of biogas use in China originated in Wuchang in 1958 in a campaign to exploit the multiple functions of biogas production, which simultaneously solved the problems of the disposal of manure and improvement of hygiene.

The third wave of biogas use occurred between the late 1970s and early 1980s when the Chinese government considered biogas production an effective and rational use of natural resources in rural areas. Biogas production not only provided energy, but also environmental protection and improvement of hygiene, and was an important aspect of modernization of agriculture. Some 6 million digesters were set up in China, which became the biogas capitol of the world, attracting many from the developing countries to learn from it. The ‘China dome’ digester became the standard construction to the present day (Fig. 1) [4], especially for small-scale domestic use. But many new types of rural household digesters have also been built based on water pressure, as for example, the plug flow auto-cycle rural digester, the up-flow small scale digester, the fender digester, and recently, the pulse flow anaerobic reactor...

Alternative Energy Promotion Center article on the success of a biogas effort in Nepal

BSP has successfully achieved the following results by the end of Dec 2007:

* Installed 172,858 biogas plants
* 72 private Biogas Companies have been strengthened
* 16 Biogas appliances manufacturing workshops are developed
* Comprehensive quality standards and quality control system is developed
* 95% of constructed plants are in operation
* 65% toilets are connected with biogas plants
* 74% of bio-slurry is utilized as an organic compost fertilizer
* Biogas programme is being developed as a first CDM project in Nepal
* BSP is an ISO 9001:2000 certification holder for its strong quality management system and subsidy administration.
* 180 micro finance institutes got wholesale loan from AEPC's Biogas Credit Fund.
* 1,080,000 persons are directly benefited by biogas plants
* 11,000 persons got employment

Nepal project wins Ashden award

...The Biogas Sector Partnership (BSP) in Nepal managed the installation of over 124,000 domestic biogas plants in Nepal between 1992 and 2005. The plants use cattle manure to provide biogas for cooking and lighting. In addition, about 75% of the plants incorporate toilets.

About 80% of the 4.2 million households in Nepal use fuelwood, cattle-dung cakes and agricultural residues for cooking, and kerosene for lighting. Demand for fuelwood substantially exceeds the rate of regrowth, and this is leading to degradation of the land and damage to vital watersheds. Cooking indoors over open fires, and lighting with kerosene, gives dangerous exposure to air pollutants and a high risk of fire, particularly for women and young children who spend much of their time indoors. In addition, women and girls have the drudgery of collecting fuelwood, which typically takes three hours each day.

The Ashden judges commended this project for the many benefits which it provides. The biogas plants replace nearly all the use of fuelwood, and make cooking easier, cleaner and safer. In 20% of houses biogas provides safer lighting as well. This saving of unsustainable fuelwood use also reduces carbon dioxide emissions. The provision of toilets improves sanitation; and the effluent from the biogas plant is a valuable organic compost...

In Costa Rica,
Biogas: Alternative Energy at Work

People in Costa Rica are experiencing improved financial, environmental, and health conditions due to the utilization of bio-gas technology. This page is loaded with useful links to learn more, too, including design and construction.)

The University of Adelaide Beginners Guide to Biogas

I also read that a train system in Sweden is run on biogas from plants.
*edit
Here, a paper on the work in Sweden:
Biogas from manure and waste products- Swedish case studies

[Doomer]

Very interesting but I think most Americans would object to cooking their food using a stranger's dung.

[Nu Kua]

Why not their own dung?

Mother Jones article:
The Top Six Ways to Convert Poop Into Electricity

[iulian28ti]

Why not convert poop into fertilizer and wind into electricity ?
Don't complicate things

[Skygirl]

Originally Posted by iulian28ti

Why not convert poop into fertilizer and wind into electricity ?
Don't complicate things

Biosludge is dangerous as a fertilizer, at least currently. My brothers neighbor used it on his fields, it leached onto my brother property and killed his horse. This happened in Liberty, Maine.

This story from Seattle is almost ten years old and things have not improved much since then.

http://web.archive.org/web/200107130...l?StoryID=9137

I think it makes far more sense to use it as fuel (then maybe farmers could get a methane credit instead of the proposed methane tax which will bankrupt most small dairy farms).

[iulian28ti]

Biosludge is dangerous as a fertilizer, at least currently. My brothers neighbor used it on his fields, it leached onto my brother property and killed his horse. This happened in Liberty, Maine.

What ?! Are you fucking kidding me ?
Just because his horses drunk... shit.... doesn't meant it isn't the oldest and one of the best fertilizers ever used.

Unless you're gonna mix shit with chlorine.... then you've got nothing to worry about.
Oh well, you have to let it dry first, otherwise half the crop will be dead

[Skygirl]

Originally Posted by iulian28ti

What ?! Are you fucking kidding me ?
Just because his horses drunk... shit.... doesn't meant it isn't the oldest and one of the best fertilizers ever used.

Unless you're gonna mix shit with chlorine.... then you've got nothing to worry about.
Oh well, you have to let it dry first, otherwise half the crop will be dead

Did you read the article I linked?

Historical use of human waste is one thing. We really have no idea of knowing if it had adverse effects. Simply drying it would not work, learn about composting. Any type of animal waste needs to compost and break down prior to or it will have adverse effects, it needs to break down first, otherwise it will 'burn' crops. With all the junk we humans put in our system, heavy metals and other toxins do not break down, they accumulate. If you had read the article you would have seen that heavy metals for example double, quadruple and with titanium, muliplies by 200 in a six year period. Heavy metals have serious conciquences, they are not good for you. Unless you think cancer is good...

[selthar]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWf9n...eature=related

Here's something to consider...

[iulian28ti]

Did you read the article I linked?

Historical use of human waste is one thing. We really have no idea of knowing if it had adverse effects. Simply drying it would not work, learn about composting. Any type of animal waste needs to compost and break down prior to or it will have adverse effects, it needs to break down first, otherwise it will 'burn' crops. With all the junk we humans put in our system, heavy metals and other toxins do not break down, they accumulate. If you had read the article you would have seen that heavy metals for example double, quadruple and with titanium, muliplies by 200 in a six year period. Heavy metals have serious conciquences, they are not good for you. Unless you think cancer is good...

Yes, yes, crop "burning", that's what my little cow was talking about.
Yes, composting, i know. I should have used the technical term, not "dry"

As for metals, yes, and not only metals. Many other things dirtier than shit itself.
But until now, "clean shit" has not hurt anyone.... If you're referring to the "industrial shit" like the one that's being dumped in our rivers, then yeah, i agree with you, WE'RE GONNA DIE IF WE TOUCH IT !

[Mezurashi]

burning shit for fuel is wrong for one basic reason - Fixing Carbon.

if we are all concerned about CO2 emissions then the Worst thing to do to dung is burn it. Composting is the Best thing to do ...

why? well, when you burn anything it releases CO2 - but burning dung releases CO2 that has been fixed and is ready to be reincorporated into the environment.

it makes no sense to me to try and stop CO2 emissions if we're just going to send it back up in the sky with our 'alternative' means of energy production.

but if we hit another Maunder Minimum then burning shit will become required By Law in order to help rebuild the greenhouse gasses that will be needed to keep us out of the deep freeze.

I say sterilize it through dehydration and UV bombardment, encase it in Lucite and sell it as paperweights ... oh, wait, that's already been done ...

[Perfectionist]

One day, with a trembling voice full of regret and shame, we'll be telling our grand-kids how we wasted so much oil/coal/gas which brought about an Energy Crisis and turned Mankind's bright and prosperous future, in to darkness and struggle ..... the next day, with a trembling voice full of even more regret and shame, we'll be telling our grand-kids how we wasted all our hot steamy dumps .....

"You mean you'd take a shit and just flush it down the toilet! Why Grandpa why!"

"I'm so sorry my dear sweet boy, it would smell really bad and I wanted nothing to do with it - I was such a fool!"

Lets hope our children forgive us .....