Comments on: Getting Biofuel from the World’s Garbage

By: R L Dam

R L Dam — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 06:59:43 +0000

Energy from waste will be viable proposition provided the technology available are affordable and functional.
Would like to know where i can get more study material, name & contact person whom can be contacted for such technological equipment.

By: Neal Van Milligen

Neal Van Milligen — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 21:40:43 +0000

Nihaar, conversion of waste to energy can be along several paths. Ethanol from the organic fraction of the waste stream is simple fermentation. Heat and electricity via gasification is old technology brought back for today. A simple gasifier can use a wide variety of waste material as fuel in a clean process to replace natural gas for heat and power. On a small scale all of this is very economical.

Would you like us to help you?

Neal Van Milligen
New Range Power Corp
cavm[AT]aol.com

By: nihaar

nihaar — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 17:40:50 +0000

How expensive is this cause if it is not then its surprising why is it not common?
What are the disadvantages of using it in developing countries like India?

By: Tenzin Choephel

Tenzin Choephel — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 06:41:31 +0000

wow! that was wonderful, i always think why don’t we change the waste to energy. So today it did i love it
Superb!

By: Erik

Erik — Thu, 20 May 2010 19:34:43 +0000

Andy Cipollo and Harnessingthegrid.com is a scam.

By: Louis Barnard

Louis Barnard — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 21:23:53 +0000

I have developed a very effective method to turn solid waste into a very cheap and useful fuel… excellent for household cooking and space- and water heating. Industry may recycle their own waste to save energy by the same technology. We are now in discussions with government and other organisations in South Africa to get this available to all.

By: james brown

james brown — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 10:32:31 +0000

Even though lot changes comes with advance technology in daily life. Simple and short concept.
e.g.: when you travel in train or bus for a long period you need to buy water bottle or cool drinks plastics bags. After u suppose to throw the bottle while travelling. This u alone thinks of the 8.32 million people in India and 100 million people all over the world buying and throwing concept. Save the plastic bags by putting snacks bags in one area when the next station comes or next stops.

By: deepak

deepak — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:53:50 +0000

Dear Dave, In Mumbai alone 6500 MT of waste is generated daily! I live in Chandigarh (North India) and a garbage processing plant failed miserably even after spending millions. Can You suggest the answer. How to contact you?

By: Dave

Dave — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:32:44 +0000

Technology is available to convert Municipal solid Waste to green coal in Europe. Government and enterprise must be willing to invest to solve waste problems. Garbage is a worldwide problem.

Any one interested in this Technology can contact me.

By: Chris Hooymans

Chris Hooymans — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:16:05 +0000

I always said “Don’t worry, the landfills of today will be the stripmines of tomorrow” and so it happens.

By: Max

Max — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:51:46 +0000

I think that our goal should be to actually reduce the amounts of garbage that we’re producing.

By: John Spencer

John Spencer — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 23:42:04 +0000

Though I agree with the simplicity of making electric, I have to warn you about quoting electric rates for savings. If you use the electricity yourself to displace electricity purchased from the electric company, then you are probably pretty close. However if you sell the electricity back to the power company, depending on what State you live in you will get different sales prices, some as low as 4 cents/kwh. Not all States require power companies to buy the electricity you make, they might take it for what their generation costs are which is typically about 1/3 the total cost of electricity you buy.

By: Neal Van Milligen

Neal Van Milligen — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:28:24 +0000

It is no trick to make electric power, heat, clean water and other products including liquid fuel from waste products. It only requires the commitment of capital to fund the process.

A 1MW gasification power plant can be put in operation for about $3,000,000 USD consuming about 30 tons of sorted trash per day. Revenue from power generation can pay a net of $800,000 per year at $.13 kW power revenue and depending on the cost of fuel processing.

Neal Van Milligen
Bioten Power and Energy Group

By: Richard marchitto

Richard marchitto — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:25:53 +0000

There is a company that can take garbage all kinds, and turn the heat generated by use of the Biosphere process to electrical energy. It is in use today in many countries even the USA. There is no harmful escape of pollutants and the ash produced can be used in concrete. The company’s symbol is GEECF.

By: John Spencer

John Spencer — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:58:31 +0000

Glad to see the continued effort for use of our solid wastes.

As one said there is no one solution for everything. ‘

The first step is to not create waste in the first place. I am appalled by how much garbage I produce. Our garbage can is full each week. I have one of the big ones, probably 100 gallons (3 regular garbage cans). It weighs a lot for sure. Each one of use can and should reduce our solid waste, and one way to do it is to try and reduce the amount of products we buy which ultimately create waste. Packaging is the biggest culprit. In this case a bigger package wins in terms of the amount of solid waste for product purchased. My collection company has said no light weight boxes, like cereal boxes, beer/soda cartons, boxes of pasta, rice and on and on. Why? Well these materials cannot be recycled too well as they have a lot of inks on them. They also are not too healthy burning for the same reason, ink. There is less packaging per weight of product if you buy a larger size.

Second of course is recycle. A recent statistic says we recycle only 20% of what can be recycled. At least in my neighborhood, nearly all off the families have recycle bins.

Plastics, recycle everything you can. I rinse out just about everything, except for things like peanut butter. Same for cans. I peel the label off so as to not have this burn.

I do all this yet there is still way too much waste in my garbage. I guess I have to start working on it more.

Lastly though, then we can turn this waste into energy. There are not many incinerators around. I recently saw a video about the largest one in the US if not the world located in New Jersey. It it incredible how much garbage it burns each day, generating huge amounts of electricity. Yet we continue to fill landfills everywhere. Too bad. Maybe more will be built.

Unfortunately plastic recycling is not a very good energy saver. It takes a lot of energy to melt the plastic, plus a lot of effort to sort it into different types. Metal cans are much more efficient to recycle versus mining the metals from the ground.

By: Millercs

Millercs — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 12:56:08 +0000

If you’re interested in efforts to produce biofuels and biopower from waste of all kinds I refer you to the BIOenergy BlogRing starting with the BIOwaste Blog at http://biowaste.blogspot.com . The important issues are: What control should we exercise to insure that any waste that can be recycled is before the post-recyclables are converted to recover their energy? What must be done to insure that the conversion technology does not emit toxins like dioxins, NOx, and SOx?

By: Errol Radebe

Errol Radebe — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 06:17:22 +0000

Developed countries have a tendency of abusing underdeveloped countries at the same time pretending to care. we need to start taking positive things into our own hands i.e. we need to be at the forfront in supporting renewable energy sources.

By: Jennifer Pennock

Jennifer Pennock — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 06:16:52 +0000

Once again, solving two problems! Very innovative.

By: Joshua A. Lowery

Joshua A. Lowery — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 06:16:34 +0000

Janae, a family size generator is possible. However (you knew that was coming right!?! ), a standard family (say 4.5 people excluding animals/livestock/fisheries) does not create enough waste bio-mass to sustain the necessary gas levels, quantities, and qualities for day-to-day use. With that being said, a family could use the bio-mass generator… Read More to supplement other technologies as a “power booster”. Example: use solar water heaters, solar electric cells w/ battery storage on site, ground effect cooling methods (if you local strata can support drilling or digging), and in-home heat recyclers in your HVAC system (think of residential size heat recovery wheels)—All of these can be low voltage systems. Now back to your bio-mass generator and how it will supplement the low-voltage endeavors. Lets assume you are growing your own gardens/ keep all your grass clippings/etc. it will take a certain amount of time, pressure, and enzymatic/chemical reactants to break down the bio-mass to release the useable “sweet” gases in sufficient quantities for the generator (whether it is boiler generator or otherwise) to operate efficiently enough to charge up heavier duty power cells, run pumps for water tower/hydrodynamic power schemas, perform advanced heat loading, etc. Depending on the consistencies of the bio-mass will dictate what type of “recipes” your family will have to come up with regards to how to plan for predictable energy yields and meeting storage/power requirements of your household. All this is possible, now, convincing manufacturers to produce these technologies in sufficient enough quantities is another story. In the law of supply and demand, the cost of the supply will go down to being affordable as the demand goes up (along with more manufacturing competition be available). So, how do we increase demand? People need to stop thinking that chemistry, physics, basic engineering, etc. is beyond them… it is not! It just takes time and effort. Once you have an understanding, the rest can fall in to place abit easier.

By: Andy Cipollo

Andy Cipollo — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 06:16:04 +0000

One of our companies, Atlas Landfill Energy Corporation, turns collected garbage and existing trash dumps into energy-producing sources, not only of electricity but also of drinking water, salt (brine), gas and carbon-based products. Visit http://www.harnessingthegrid.com/?page_id=277 for more details.