Another important finding in Appell's research is the function of water in the thermal conversion process as a solvent and a reactant. This is even more important in the conversion of livestock manure slurry where a large quantity of water exists and dewatering is infeasible costly. Taking advantage of water content in raw manure will greatly value the conversion process, not only producing energy but also lightening the wastewater intense from livestock farm...
Through thermochemical conversion technology, the conversion rate of organic matter in the raw manure can be as high as 90% or more (Appell et al., 1980; White and Taiganides, 1971). The solids and the wastewater are separated and COD in the wastewater is greatly reduced. The successful TCC processor shall be an on-site unit that directly processes fresh manure from the barn. Thus, much less storage is required. TCC processor will be compact and much less space occupying than those of biological treatment processes such as lagoons and digesters do. Another benefit of such a short period of manure storage time is the odor reduction – less storage time means less odor emission.
As a successful TCC unit for a large confinement hog farm, the energy needed for running the processor is most likely self-sustainable, i.e., the liquid fuel produced from the TCC processor could be used as the energy input for the processor needs. With the major portion of the organic solids removed from the swine manure, the post-processes waste is most possibly suitable for municipal treatment with a simple pre-treatment. The solid residues are greatly minimized and convenient for disposal.
[Lots of useful info for clarification on this issue presented through embedded links.]
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Tom Johnson
Fascinating.
Blogcritics: who knows what hot topic will be tackled next - it could be masturbation, it could be thermal depolymerization.
2 - Eric Olsen
Excellent topic Marla, we also talked about it a couple weeks ago here
3 - Tom DeGisi
Stephen Den Beste talks about the feasibility of biomass energy here and here. It may work, but it won't be a very large source of energy. If it was, we would be doing a lot more farming (for energy instead of food) which would be very hard on the environment.
---- Yours,
---- 3om
4 - Marla
Eric -- Love the Soylent Green reference. :-0
5 - Marla
Tom J -- Doing what I can to promote topic diversity. :-)
6 - Marla
Tom D -- If I may, I'd like to quote from the Discover magazine article which brought this to the popular science forefront recently:
Just converting all the U.S. agricultural waste into oil and gas would yield the energy equivalent of 4 billion barrels of oil annually. In 2001 the United States imported 4.2 billion barrels of oil.
That refers to agricultural waste alone -- turkey guts, swine manure, corn husks, etc. According to Appel, with the right times and temperatures -- something they have already established for numeous varieties of feedstock -- TDP can convert any carbon-based substance. Sewage, industrial waste, and common household and business waste could all be converted. Refrigerators, batteries, stale bread, newspaper, old furniture -- anything that would ordinarily end up in a waste processing plant, landfill, or garbage barge to be dumped in the ocean could be processed.
According to this site, "all of U.S. industry produces 300,000 tons of hazardous waste annually."
According to this site, "In 1998, the United States produced 6.5 billion tons of waste. [...] This waste includes components from raw materials extraction, materials processing and manufacturing, materials dissipated into the environment during product use, and post-consumer and municipal wastes. This volume of waste is increasing annually, as is total resource consumption. With the simple addition of future population growth, the increased social, environmental and economic stress from resource use and waste will only become worse."
It seems to me that is probably adequate feedstock, at least when combined with conservation efforts and continued developent of alternative fuel sources, to nearly eliminate fossil fuel imports and forestall energy-purpose farming. The DOE certainly seems to think biomass conversion is a promising technology, though they are apparently focusing on ethanol production.
7 - M. Simon
I'm surprised that there is no mention of: The Deep Hot Biosphere (Copernicus/Springer-Verlag, $27) by Thomas Gold.
He thinks oil comes from space and some high temperature biologic process not depolymerized fossil trees and dino flesh.
8 - theotherwaldo
-Several points that everyone seems to be missing:
First, oil companies don't have to build thermal depolymerization plants from scratch. All that they would have to build are the shredder, thermal digester, flash-depressurization gear, and solids separators. The rest of the process is handled by standard cracking and blending equipment.
Second, comparing this process to alcohol, biodiesel, or even hydrogen is like comparing oranges and apples. Thermal depolymerization can fit into today's lifestyle seamlessly.
(Have you ever tried to start an alcohol-fueled vehicle on a cold day? And then de-ice the throttle body on a hot day? Or clean up a fuel system after a bad batch of biodiesel? Whew!)
Finally, who is it that so thoroughly dislikes and distrusts this idea? Seems to me that the main enemies of thermal depolymerization are the professional prophets of doom and their friends, the social sculptors.
I tend to judge an idea by its enemies, and this one seems to upset the right people.
Up Thermal Depolymerization!
9 - dr mac
theotherwaldo
well stated points
WRT "I tend to judge an idea by its enemies. . ."
By extension, would this mean that by getting into bed with the 'devil' you have (or will) come to know the will of God?
10 - Drdirt
What I want to know about TDP is where does the nitrogen and sulfur end up. Hog manure, turkey guts, and other such materials contain lots of N and S. The non-volatiles (Ca, Mg, Fe, etc. end up in the solids, but N forms ammonia under some conditions, such as reducing conditions, and seems a likely product of TDP. It is also the simplest route for deamination of amino acids on their way to becoming oil. Likewise, sulfur can assume many chemical guises, of which the most likely seem to be hydrogen sulfide or pure sulfur. Any TDP techies out there figuring this one out? It seems ike an important point if the output is to be non-polluting.
11 - Daniel Waters
Hey if that discover article is even remotely accurate and I could assuming I find the resources build Thermal Depolymerizer under my motor home including distiller then I should be able to build an Ambient Heat Condensing Generator also and convert to a hybrid and add solar panels then I could begin a Techno Gypsy Tribe adventure
Daniel Waters
19024 Elderberry st sw
Rochester WA 98579
(360)273-8080
Please contact me if this stuff appeals to you
12 - Marla
Drdirt,
Nitrogen and sulfur are byproducts of TDP, as are various other chemicals such as carbon, in varying amounts according to feedstock. The byproducts are pure, however, and ready for use in industrial processes requiring their input. Even if the need for those chemicals doesn't meet the supply, the volume of byproducts which would be waste is a tiny percentage of the volume of waste which is rendered useful through the process.
13 - Marla
Daniel,
Where were you when Jack Kerouac needed you?
14 - Phillip Winn
theotherwaldo (#8) - I personally distrust the idea (though I don't dislike it) because I'm skeptical of anything that promises a quantum leap forward from today's technology. Few times in history has a really big leap come with essentially no warning, but many many many times in history one has been promised and then been found impractical or outright fraudulent. The odds do not favor converting pig poop into free energy for all any more than they do room-temperature fusion.
Every point I here that makes it more appealing makes it less likely to be real, in my view. Don't need new equipment? Don't need extra energy? Low startup costs? Gee, do I get a set of ginsu knives too?
It doesn't help that the people pushing it have a background in business, not science, and that reputable scientists don't seem to have had much access lately. Normally how these things work is that they're published in peer-reviews journals. By going the money-making route instead, the creators are inviting skepticism. Of course, there are valid reasons for not subjecting yourself to the scrutiny of your peers if you're concerned about protecting trade secrets, but given the strong protections of patent law and the relatively low cost of filing for patents, those reasons evaporate. So why then would someone avoid the scrutiny?
I hope it's true, because not only would America's dependence on foreign sources go down, but this technology could theoretically be used to bring cheap hydrocarbon energy to places like centra Africa. That's probably a pipe dream, though, as the oppressive governments in that region tend to avoid anything that might empower their people.
15 - R Allen
It appears that some people think that TDP is free energy. It is not. It is CHEAPER energy. It is going from a natural source (oil deposits), to an artificial source (processors), much like going from salt mines to synthesized potasium chloride. There is no such thing as a free lunch, but there are cheap ones.
Comparing the costs of waste transportation and treatment coupled with the cost of searching and drilling for oil deposits in accordance with federal EPA laws, TDP looks like a down-right cheap alternative. It looks like the only people that won't benefit from it are the people that sell natural crude oil (Middle East) and drill for it (the roustabouts).
Oil is the only major source of foreign money into the Middle East that I know of. I think that without it, they will quickly revert to a poor third-world country, instead of being the rich third-world countries that they are. I think that area of the world is going to do everything that they can to derail developement and slow deployment of the technology, to acquire as much money as possible and have time to diversify their holdings.
16 - Marla
TDP is not free, and as R. Allen pointed out, there are transportation, equipment, and other related costs (staff, bureaucracy, TDP plants, etc.). However, compared to the costs of importing crude and refined petroleum products, current waste management technologies, environmental cleanup of wastes manageable by TDP, waste storage, landfill lawsuits, and other related costs, I'm pretty sure it would end up a net gain.
Also as R. Allen pointed out, petroleum is by far the middle east's biggest export, making investing in TDP a smart national security move. Force the middle east to diversify their economy and put the countries (not just the rank-and-file citizens) through an economic squeeze, and you end up with a region more amenable to doing business with the rest of the world and less inclined to throw large sums of money toward terrorism efforts.
17 - Eric Olsen
I just like the idea of fuel from turkey poop - I don't care WHAT it costs
18 - Marla
I hear ya Eric. And the fact that manure of several kinds -- poultry, swine, bovine, human -- is a big pollution problem in numerous rural communities doesn't hurt. Hey, and you could make fuel from sh!t AND Shinola.
19 - Phillip Winn
#16 - Every provider of "free" energy similarly paints his snake oil as "not free, just cheap," so that in and of itself isn't convincing.
Look, things that sound too good to be true usually are. This has been discussed here before. The numbers from the original article didn't add up - the writer was claiming zero energy cost in one place and 15% from within the system in another. Both are ridiculous. Can oil be made from crap? Sure, it has been done before. The question is, how efficiently/cheaply.
These guys haven't produced the kind of information needed to make that judgement, and there is no legitimate reason why they haven't. Hope may spring eternal, but I need more to back up this claim: "We will be able to make oil for $8 to $12 a barrel" than I've seen so far.
I hope they can do it. I'm not saying that they absolutely can't or that it is impossible. But this seems to be being treated more like a marketing exercise than any sort of real advance in science so far, which worries me.
20 - charles dodsworth
From my own viewpoint, the greatest possibility I saw in the Discover magazine article was its potential to handle toxic waste. Superfund projects would become economically feasible and we may be able to reclaim dumpsites and landfills, Garbage scows would no longer pollute the oceans and new methods of resource recovery may be feasible. For example, the toxic waters of the Anaconda mine sight could potentially be used along with municipal waste to produce minerals and oil with the flashed off water returning to dilute and detoxify the former open pit mine. Appel has stated that the process handles mixtures very well and I am hoping that the enormous potential suggested by this technology is realized. It truly does sound too good to be true but by couching his pitch in terms of economic gain, Appel may have found a pathway to saving the environment.
21 - Phillip Winn
Please pardon me if the idea that these folks "may have found a []way to sav[e] the environment" doesn't exactly provide me with any more assurance that it's true. The more wonderful claims made about this process, the less I believe that the process could work.
I hope I'm wrong, but I'll wait to see it working before I invest anything. :)
22 - Max Kislik
I really think the US government should subsidize oil/gas made using TDP to the same extent (at the least) that it is subsidizing Ethanol.
If you believe the $12 figure per barrel of Oil figure mentioned in Discover magazine, such a subsidy will make commercial investment in TDP much more attractive.
Over the long term, we can improve national security by reducing our dependence on Oil from unstable countries in the mideast and otherwise.
23 - Philip Patten
Subject: Thermal Depolymerization, False Claim of Lowering Atmospheric CO2 Levels
Re: Discovery Mag article @ http://www.discover.com/may_03/gthere.html?article=featoil.html "its backers contend it could also stem global warming...So the only carbon used would be that which already existed above the surface; it could no longer dangerously accumulate in the atmosphere. 'Suddenly, the whole built world just becomes a temporary carbon sink,' says Paul Baskis..."
TDP is delightfully promising, however: Baskis made one claim probably false, that it would be better for global CO2 levels than mined oil, etc. Where the carbon comes from or how much lies around on the surface of the planet in old tires and tree stumps probably doesn't matter for CO2 levels. What determines atmospheric CO2 levels is whether we burn carbon faster than plants photosynthesize it back into carbohydrates. TDP converts waste (which would mostly remain as disposal site solids) to fuel (plus water and and minerals), freshly available to burn into global warming CO2.
24 - Wally
Any news about the construction project in Carthage MO? It will be interesting to see if the demo plant is able to meet the needs of a medium sized meat production facility. And if the industrial application is financially beneficial for a real, profit dependent company. Making oil at $12 a barrel is nice, but saving the company a couple of million a year in transportation, storage and disposal costs is just as important. Conceivably they could sell the oil at a loss and still be happy.
25 - Malcolm
Phillip, your comments about the invalidity of claims that this process would help reduce atmospheric CO2 levels is a good one. However, if the oil created in this way replaced oil from underground petroleum products, wouldn't it reduce the total CO2 input into the atmosphere?
Even if the majority of products which would be utilized for oil manufacture "would mostly remain as disposal site solids", as you say, it seems that at least a portion of these solids would gradually, or not so gradually, become oxidixed to CO2 over time. Certainly the organics deep in a landfill don't break down in any rush, but other organic sources, e.g. cow manure, sewer plant and septic tank sludge surely do!
I'm waiting with bated breath for more news on this subject.
To everyone: I agree that what seems too good to be true usually is. The key word is "usually" (I've made enough money to retire on, almost, by closing "too good to be true" real estate deals....