[Alumni-chat] Alumni-chat Digest, Vol 6, Issue 81

[K.F.Bennett (kfbennett at hotmail.com)]

15 years ago on AEA Brazil I visited a pig farm that collected all the animal waste into huge vats that decomposed the shit and collected the gas to fuel the farm. Heat, cooking, electric generation etc.  They even used the compost on the feed crops, if I rember correctly.  The technology exists and is being used in other parts of the world. 




>No the real challenge is to find a way to ferment the piggy shit and make
>energy out of it before it flows into the streams and rivers, or fouls the
>ground water.  It is rich in energy, as is cow dung.  Next step is  fully using
>all bio waste on farms making bio-fuels using various yeasts that  eat the waste
>and produce a collectable gas and a liquid that can be made into  something
>like gasoline.  The sludge from both products is good fully  organic soil
>augmentation.  It is in part a biological research question,  and in part a matter
>of engineering.  I keep waiting to hear what happened  with the floods in SE
>Minnesota last week -- there are many huge piggy  operations in that area, with
>many private ponds where the piggy shit is allowed  to just settle.  I bet
>many were washed out.