San Antonio Generating Gas from Sewage
San Antonio, Texas is making use of its 140,000 tons of sewage generated each year to capture methane gas. The city’s utility board of trustees approved a contract this week to sell 900,000 cubic feet of natural gas derived from the sewage each day to Ameresco, a Massachusetts energy services company.
Though methane is a potent greenhouse gas, it has a variety of uses. The substance can be used for fuel in gas turbines or steam boilers, and it is also used as vehicle fuel in the form of compressed natural gas. Additionally, NASA is researching methane as a potential rocket fuel.
According to Steve Claus, the chief operating officer of the water system, San Antonio’s sewage generates 1.5 million cubic feet of gas each day—enough to fill seven commercial blimps or 1,250 tanker trucks. The facilities needed for the project will be ready in about two years.
San Antonio will get $250,000 a year for the methane—a sum that I hope will go towards more renewable energy efforts in the area.
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Great news San Antonio!!
Other U.S. cities should follow on
this is great news! i hope my hometown, vegas, will have the guts to follow san antonio.
Chandler, AZ has been doing this for years:
http://wasteage.com/mag/waste_little_landfill/
Just curious why no mention of its toxic effects is listed. Unless they somehow alter it to a safe(r) form, this is a bad idea as no one has mentioned what by-product is released after this ‘fuel’ is consumed by machinery etc. Typical that the least amount of info (none of my skepticism is directed towards you, rather directed towards the inadequate research and greedy planning done by the various bodies responsible.
I think some one had turned trash into fuel before. Wasn’t his name Dr. Emmit Brown? I think it was the Mr. Fusion he used in order to power a time machine. Give credit where credit is due.
Very cool, but how expensive is the cost of starting this program/technology? Unless San Antonio starts earning more money for this or the costs are cut down later, it would seem that they should stand to lose money for such unusual technology.
Wonderful! It’s great to see a practical, clean energy option being put into use. Way to go, San Antonio!
Yeah! This will be good for monkeys like me!
We could use this methane to supplement diesel fuels: Methane introduced into a running diesel will combust and add power. It cannot be used as a sole fuel, as even diesel heat and pressure will not set it alight, but if a small amount of diesel fuel is injected as a source of ignition, methane can burn as well. In this way, it can displace quite a lot of petroleum-based fuel. An inexpensive fumigation system could allow most diesels to displace more than 70% of the petroleum-based fuel with methane- which also burns more cleanly.
Too bad our legislators consider such a simple arrangement “tampering”! I would love to run my truck on natural gas, but it is currently illegal to do so! I would face a fine of $5000/day for even trying to do the right thing! Our laws need to change, and soon.
Please let residential home owners know when we can take advantage of this and what would be the cost of one of these?