[Waaaaay OT but who cares its cool] We might be able to turn anything in Oil soon.

[kenjib]

Quite true. If it works for a broad range of plastics at once. If it requires a large degree of fine tuning, you may need multiple facilities, which would be a large capital outlay.

For now. How might this kind of technology look 30 years from now -- especially with the kind of smart computer-aided technology that is only now starting to really blossom?

Not quite. The furnace helps to power itself. It even mostly powers itself, but you don't get out more than you put into it. The article says that it's only 85% efficient on the turkey feedstock. You need to come up with that extra 15% somewhere.

The conservation of energy can come from the input of fuel (turkey castings). As I read it, it means that the 85% is the end product while the other 15% was equivalent to the amount that fuelled the process itself. Later in the article it says that the natural gas is used to fuel the process, because it is too difficult to use in other ways.

'Thermal depolymerization, Appel says, has proved to be 85 percent energy efficient for complex feedstocks, such as turkey offal: "That means for every 100 Btus in the feedstock, we use only 15 Btus to run the process." He contends the efficiency is even better for relatively dry raw materials, such as plastics.'

'"Gas is expensive to transport, so we use it on-site in the plant to heat the process," Appel says.'

In addition, there seems to be a bit of a fib in here that might well keep you from wanting one in your home. They say that nothing hazardous comes out of the process. That is hogwash, especially if you're talking about using your old computers and electronics as feedstock. Those things are loaded with lead, and other heavy metals. Heavy metals are hazardous waste, pretty much however you slice them.

Not that this is an unmanageable or unreasonable risk. But between that and the likely need to grind stuff up to fit it through, you probably dont want it in your basement.

However, a municiple one of these would be a wonderful replacement for landfills...

Very goods points. Maybe this is just the beginning though. I certainly hope so. At the very least, though, such an efficient system run only as a utility (instead of a decentralized model) should still be a heck of a lot cheaper for the consumer since the consumer fuels the production.

 

[Cedric]

It's time for me to profess my socialist ways. I think power production should be government owned, run, financed and regulated.

I think we can all agree that electricity is a vital service and personally I'm sick of private industry having their hand in it.

The government doesn't need to make a profit. Money is not the bottom line with them. They can produce power more safely, more cleanly and charge lower prices...and you can forget about rolling brown outs in California.

What does this have to do with this topic? I think the government should start by buying these gentlemen out for a TON of money and then going into full scale use of this idea.

Cedric

 

[Zappo]

If you read the article, it states that plastic is an ideal fuel for this process. Problem potentially solved!

This is really cool. I wonder if it will turn into a household appliance. Just take your trash down into the basement and put it into your combined furnace/generator/oil creator. The furnace powers itself, heats your house, generates electricity, and gives you gasoline for your car. If you have excess you can sell gasoline or put electricity back on the power grid or store the energy in a hydrogen cell for later use -- i.e. in the summer you bulk up hydrogen cells for use in the winter when your heating demands go up and people in colder regions up North can buy excess energy generated by people with fewer energy demands in the South.

Another way you could do it would be to exchange seasonal energy fluctuations between the north and south hemisphere.

This is the kind of energy revolution that people have been discussing since hydrogen cells hit the market. The problem you don't always hear about is that hydrogen cells are only a storage medium and it requires more energy to power them then they provide, thus they don't lessen dependance on foreign oil until we can move our power plants away from fossil fuels (fat chance without new technology like this article suggests).

If I understand right, this is *(&(*$#!& brilliant! In combination with fuel cells, it could very well mark an entire new historical era on the way...

EDIT: Oh, and it gives you drinking-quality water to boot! It seems almost like a "stillsuit" at the societal level.

Thermodynamics make sure that there's a catch somewhere in this cycle. Nevertheless, it sounds like an extremely efficient way to manage energy and waste. A pity that when you burn that oil you get pollution, whether you burn it into your car, or you burn it into a power plant to get the electrical power to produce the hydrogen for your car. But until fusion reactors, there's no such thing as free energy...

However, I've heard far too many technomiracles that turned out being a soap bubble. I'll trust this when it gets government funds to build commercial plants, and I'll believe it's a miracle when the number of plants starts doubling each year (which, less or more, is what really world-shaking technology does).

 

[Umbran]

The conservation of energy can come from the input of fuel (turkey castings). As I read it, it means that the 85% is the end product while the other 15% was equivalent to the amount that fuelled the process itself. Later in the article it says that the natural gas is used to fuel the process, because it is too difficult to use in other ways.

You put in 100 btu of turkey. You use 15 btu to run the process, and you get 85 btu of stuff (oil and gas). You are getting out less than you put in. The loss of 15% means that you cannot run this as a closed cycle.

That is what I mean by it only mostly powers itself. My pardon if I didn't say it clearly. Somewhere, you must add energy to the system. In the case of turkey, that energy comes from the sun - via the grain the turkey eats.

At the very least, though, such an efficient system run only as a utility (instead of a decentralized model) should still be a heck of a lot cheaper for the consumer since the consumer fuels the production.

While the system may be able to handle glass and metal as inputs, there's not much chemical energy in them. I am not sure of the btu content of the organic and plastic bits of typical home garbage. Nor am I aware about how many btu get thrown away by all the organics-processors (meat and vegetable processing). People sure use a lot of BTU to heat their homes in the winter...

 

[Zeddan]

Sounds like a really neat idea.
85% efficiency is great in the thermodynamic world.
It means that some of the energy contained in the turkey guts is used to fuel the process. As stated in the atricle older methods of this were extremely inefficient. i.e. it took more energy to mkae the oil than was produced. Gasoline hybrids are the way to go. Solar cells are horrible inefficient. They never produce the amount of power that was required to make them and the byproducts of solar cell production are some nasty chemicals.

Fuel cells are a great idea, but the production of hydrogen takes a lot of energy. until someone figures out a way to efficiently produce the hydrogen then we are out of luck there. Nuclear would be great if we could do something about the nuclear fallout that develops from the 80 car pile up on the interstate and the spent fuel in the engine.

Also realize what this method would mean for waste disposal. No more huge landfills. That in of itself would offset any increased pollution from the gasoline.

Also the purified water is huge, unless of course it tastes like turkey guts.

All in all a neat idea, one step closer to the Mr. Fusion.
Anybody have any banana peels, my Delorean is waiting.

 

[Zeddan]

The government doesn't need to make a profit. Money is not the bottom line with them. They can produce power more safely, more cleanly and charge lower prices...and you can forget about rolling brown outs in California.
Cedric

Uh, do we really don't want anymore of that. They would take a somewhat competitive industry and make it run horribly inefficiently. Think Post Office. Let's build a new power plant and raise the price of electricity by 5 cents per kWh. Year later - 10 cent raise. We promise it will get better....

 

[DerianCypher]

Then again,

the post office is run independantly of the government. It's government owned and that's about it.

 

[Chauzu]

Heck, I wouldn't care if it was privately owned or government owned. I'd support this project definetly!

 

[JacktheRabbit]

Which then never (in a practical sense) biodegrades. Really plastic is more of a problem than atmospheric pollutants in some ways, I'd think. Particularly in a disposable material culture....

Read the article. They can use this process on plastics as well.

Also I could be wrong but some types of fertilizer are created from petroluem products.

Then there is also fuels that you cannot hybrid. Sure your car might work one day on a hybrid but it will be a whole lot longer before a 747 or a military jet fighter will do the same.

 

[JacktheRabbit]

It's time for me to profess my socialist ways. I think power production should be government owned, run, financed and regulated.

I think we can all agree that electricity is a vital service and personally I'm sick of private industry having their hand in it.

The government doesn't need to make a profit. Money is not the bottom line with them. They can produce power more safely, more cleanly and charge lower prices...and you can forget about rolling brown outs in California.

What does this have to do with this topic? I think the government should start by buying these gentlemen out for a TON of money and then going into full scale use of this idea.

Cedric

If I was this guy then I would tell the Federal Government they dont have enough money to buy this off me.

Best way to guaruntee that it will be screwed up.