Home Biomass Power Generators

TLouden writes "The Rocky Mountain News had an article today about Community Power Corp. and its new BioMax unit which uses renewable resources such as corncobs, sawdust pellets, and coconut shells to produce electricity. This gasifier unit isn't commercially available yet but we might be seeing it sometime in 2004."

Comments

Always a catch.

[Torgo's Pizza]

Coconut shells? Darn. Too bad that in North America we don't have enough African Swallows to supply them.

Re:Always a catch.

[Unregistered]

maybe 2 European swallows carried it

Sounds like..

[erpbridge]

Yes, I think it might be...

Mr Fusion!!!

Wait a minute.

[Anonymous Coward]

I already have a home biomass generator. Oh, you mean a home biomass power generator....

Will it?

[insecuritiez]

Burn AOL CDs or will we have to wait for the upgraded toxic waste burning model?

Sooner then later

[mao che minh]

This is probably where things are going (albeit in the distant future). Most of our power comes from sources that aren't feasibly replenishable, such as coal and oil. There aren't a whole lot of huge waterfalls around or places to build dams, so hydro-electric plants aren't going to solve the problem. Solar power is a way to go, but it is rather expensive. Wind power is always uncertain.

In short, natural sources of energy aren't enough. We will have to start getting creative soon.

Re:Sooner then later

[DakotaSandstone]

Could we keep using oil forever? Sure. Heck, even if we ran out of traditional oil, there'd be almost limitless oil shale deposits. We'd just need to get an economy of scale going to make them cost effective.

But should we continue using oil, coal, etc? When we have purple air quality days in cities where it's unsafe even for olympic atheletes to exert outdoors? I sincerely hope you aren't so blind to the effects oil and gas consumption have on our air that you have never noticed how the air sometimes turns yellow in some cities??

"Not in some sort of crisis?" I suppose next you'll tell me fresh drinking water isn't a big 21st century issue, since "I can obviously just go turn on the tap and get clean water."

Open your eyes. It's a big world out there.

Re:Sooner then later

[heli0]

"at least a quarter of the energy in the US is produced by coal"

Actually it is over 50%.

Total Electric Power Industry Summary Statistics

Energy Production (Thousand MWh)
All Energy Sources: 303,091
Coal: 154,690

Great for...

[Black Parrot]

Great for disposing of bodies, too.

Distributed Energy

[heli0]

The California Energy Commission has some info on different types of distributed energy resources from solar/wind/fuelcells to good ole ICE and turbines; listing their fuel sources, efficiency, environmental hazards, production capabilities and current availability; along with best applications, costs, performance, strengths & weaknesses, future developments, and where to buy them.

The page for microturbines is currently down, but the rest are up.

Re:Practical?

[bobbozzo]

Dude, you're talking about methane emissions (surplus methane generated by other processes).

This would be BURNING the methane, which would produce CO2 and H20, similar to burning natural gas.

I have never heard that burning methane is any worse than burning any other carbon-based fuel.

In full scale use in many countries

[vinsci]

These guys developed waste treatment to commercial scale years ago, and it's successfully deployed in full scale in several countries.

The WAASA PROCESS, developed by Citec, has a reputation for being the most wide-ranging digestion experience in the world.

The WAASA PROCESS is in operation in Mustasaari outside city of Vaasa, Finland and in Kil, Sweden and in Tokyo, Japan. One of the largest MSW digestion plants in the world is a WAASA PROCESS in Groningen, Netherlands.

FYI: I worked at this company a couple of years back.

Re:Practical?

[rgmoore]

Not only that, but biomass is essentially a closed cycle. All of the CO2 that you're generating is coming from plants that recently took that same CO2 out of the air, so there's no net addition of greenhouse gasses. This is a direct contrast to fossil fuels, where the carbon was previously buried in the ground for millions of years.

Calorific Values Of Fuels

[heli0]

GigaJoule Per Tonne

chicken shit: 8.8
wood: 10.0
meat & bone: 18.6
coal: 30.0
tires: 32.0
diesel: 45.6
propane: 49.4

----

http://www.lowpay.gov.uk/energy/inform/calvalues .p df

Why you didn't read the article?

[benjamindees]

Or even the summary?

This is a gasifier. It doesn't burn the biomass directly. It converts the biomass into clean gas fuel just like it would naturally decompose. It's actually more enviromnentally responsible because it supposedly makes use of excess materials that would otherwise be left to decompose into the atmosphere.

Agricultural surplus

[2toise]

There is a huge amount of federal money that goes into maintaining a massive agricultural surplus here in the states - this could easily be switched over to subsidies for fuel crops instead of (for example) tobacco, as is presently the case.
It would not supply all the needs by any means, but would help.
At present much is shipped overseas as 'aid', but rarely is this the most cost effective way to get food to war stricken areas.

Re:Same to you, buddy!

[Dashing Leech]

> Coal power may be dirty, but the combined pollution of a thousand small biogas combustion generators is much worse than a large coal generator with equivalent power output.

Except that you are missing one important point. Coal (and other fossil fuels) release CO2 (and other gases) that are currently stored in the ground, so they are added to the environment. Biomass gases are created from the very plants that use them within the environment, so there is no net gain of gases in the environment.

Biomass energy is already here and practical...

[qtp]

Well maybe it is in Iowa and Minnesota, but it has proven to be both efficient and profitable for small scale producers, as discussed here back in March.

The systems described in the main article do not sound very practical to me (800 degrees F. takes a lot of energy to maintain), but they are not the only example of biomass energy being put into practise, and they might be the right choice if you already have a lot of sawdust on hand (like in a lumberyard or a furniture fab).

Anything that reduces the dependency on foreign oil is good for the economy, and less dependency on large energy companies is good for the consumer. That these technologies allow small business to reduce thier cost of operation (or increase thier income) and are environmentally sound is good for everyone.

What about human waste?

[mellon]

One of the puzzles about this article is that this biomass generator doesn't use one of the most significant sources of biomass in a typical household. I know it's icky, but there's energy in it. Plus, if you live in a place with a serious septic problem, extracting gases and composting what's left would be big win.