Posted: 5/17/2008 5:10:35 AM EDT
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I'm curious if anyone has looked into methane digesters for heating/fuel needs. We're looking at building a house in the country, and thought this might be a interesting concept for a septic system , to produce high grade fertilizer & methane gas. It'd make maintenance higher, but in the long run might be a good idea. Any thoughts? |
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Gobar gas plant info Do a google search for "gobar gas" or "gobar plant" or "gobar power" -- there's lots of info out there. I think it makes a lot of sense. You get power and ready to use fertilizer. |
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Back around 1990 I saw a program on a pig farmer in G Britain who had a digester. He heated all his buildings and ran all his equipment, including his little car on methane. A couple of years ago a company wanted to put in a huge pork operation near here. People raised hell because of the pig shit lagoon they wanted to use (soil here doesn't perk well). It's a shame there is no market for methane around here. They could have put in a digester, solved their waste problem and made additional income. |
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The following won't help you with turning your septic system into a methane digesters but the UN put out a couple of booklets on Biogas. They are available for download at the New Zealand Digital Library . I put the link for the first book below and you should be able find the 2'nd book at the same location Better Farming Series 31. Biogas: What it is; How it is Made; How to Use it www.greenstone.org/greenstone3/nzdl?a=d&d=HASH0126a01fca9b24ca26eadc70&c=envl&sib=&ed=1&p.s=ClassifierBrowse&p.sa=&p.a=b&p.c=envl Better Farming Series 32 - Biogas 2: Building a Better Biogas Unit A quick qoogle search also shows both books available for sale at www.fao.org/icatalog/search/result.asp?subcat_id=7 These books deal with making biogas using 30 and 55 gallon drums and appear do-able by a normal person with minimal equipment |
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You should check these out in Nepal. I also saw used in Indo while there Nepal Bio fuel Homes bio Fuel home Wish you luck. Most zoning laws will not let you do this if they know about it. |
I have seen these in operation in Nepal. Appropriate technology and sustainabilty are the keys to their success. The ones I witnessed used only animal dung. It was too hard to sell the concept of piping waste from your toilet to a tank then running a pipe from the tank into your kitchen  +1 on receiving any CONUS Health Dept./Building Code blessing. |
| These seem very interesting to me, but how useful is the methane gas out of one of these small digesters, really? Is the user counting on enough "natural" pressure to get flow to whatever devices, or is it being pumped and stored at pressure? What happens if the user depletes the usable amount of gas, wouldn't that risk a gas/oxygen mix inside the digester resulting in a potential bomb? |
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First thought: It appears that you could just put an outlet pipe on a standard septic tack and store the gas in a large rated tank (a propane tank)? Would you need to pressurize the system? How many psi? How would you do it? Would a family of 3 produce enough S#$T or would you have to add a garbage disposal, or a way to grind and add yard waste? Second Thought: We already collect human wast in US Cities. How much Methane could be collected from these systems? Third Thought: How would I convert a car to run off Methane? Cost? I have not had time to go through the links. |