Eclipse Now Posted September 23, 2009 Report Share Posted September 23, 2009 Hi all,I was just wondering if I could move this in a slightly different direction and ask about cow pooh and especially humanure? Please check out this smallish video file (4 minutes) green.tv » Video Starts off showing them collecting cow pooh but then shows pipes that can one day be connected up to toilets. BUT they seem to be using the slurry leftover muck DIRECTLY on their crops! No no NO! This can cause disease.... I thought we should NEVER put this stuff directly on the crops, but had it removed from the crops by a degree of separation. EG: By all means fertilise fruit trees with it and energy crops with it, and then use clippings from fruit trees and energy crops (like switchgrass) to compost and then compost to soil? But never put sewerage slurry directly onto the veggie patch, for example! Also, I'm really glad to hear that biochar use is so widespread these days. Can anyone tell me if they know if major city sewerage systems could be fitted to biochar sewerage (with maybe council green waste) and if so, would it lose too many of the nutrients from the slurry? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted September 23, 2009 Report Share Posted September 23, 2009 I'm wondering, but have waste processing facilities and farmers considered pyrolysis of humanure and animal manures to produce biochar? That would sterilize the poo, reduce its volume and weight, and put it back in the ground for better purposes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ganoderma Posted September 24, 2009 Author Report Share Posted September 24, 2009 there are some farmers doing this. there is a good write up of a larger scale chicken farm, i think in the states, using this to generate power and also sells the remaining char to other farmers. i looked into it briefly because i have a plant farm and the in laws have a large pig farm...but the cost stopped us from doing it....seems really wet poop, like pig poo always is after washing out the pig sties (is that how you spell it?). being pretty much liquid it seemed efficiency was poor....at least in other peoples systems. not sure how it would work with human systems as there is lost of non human waste flushed down the toilet...wonder if tissue is ok in these systems...i assume it would be fine...but i cant see all the plastic and chemicals helping anything. at least with farming waste it is more or less clean poo...at least in the sense there is no litter. EG: By all means fertilise fruit trees with it and energy crops with it, and then use clippings from fruit trees and energy crops (like switchgrass) to compost and then compost to soil? But never put sewerage slurry directly onto the veggie patch, for example! hooking up to anything where it comes into contact with the end product seems pretty sketchy....like you say fruit crops and non food crops would probably be the best use. about 15 years ago one of the biggest farms in our area (in canada) wanted to use human waste (treated somehow) on their daffodil fields (many acres). city council was all fr it but the town complained too much, so it keeps getting dumped into the ocean....much better...:phones: Essay, that is very interesting stuff. i jsut got that book, not much time to really get into right now but i flip the odd page here and there. some neat stuff in there. i am deciding on using say 10foot lengths of the coconut trees, assuming i can have them for free, and making a pile stacked on their sides into a triangle say 6 feet tall +/-. i will fill all the cracks with coco coir (great for fungal growth). i will have re bar sticking out of the pile with ropes tide at the top to form a "mesh" about 4 feet above the logs following their shape, this will grow vines. the idea is to inoculate the logs with mushrooms, likely ganoderma, and let the plants above shade them and also keep humidity in. it will also increase surface area for the plants so i will theoretically get more yield from the vines. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipse Now Posted September 24, 2009 Report Share Posted September 24, 2009 And, if anyone happens to be an expert in this areas, what nutrients might be lost from our pooh & sewerage if we did it this way? Maybe it's best to ferment the pooh in a digester and harvest the methane off the top, but then apply the pooh slurry to fertilise some 'in between' stage crop as I suggested above. (Not sure what these crops are called, but some people talk about sewer slurry fertilising fruit trees etc and crops where the pooh never touches the crop, and so contamination cannot occur... and then fertilising other parts of the garden occurs after that in between crop has been harvested or pruned and composted.) Blargh! I have too much reading to do... I'll have to get out my old copy of the Permaculture book. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted September 27, 2009 Report Share Posted September 27, 2009 there are some farmers doing this. there is a good write up of a larger scale chicken farm, i think in the states, using this to generate power and also sells the remaining char to other farmers. i looked into it briefly because i have a plant farm and the in laws have a large pig farm...but the cost stopped us from doing it....seems really wet poop, like pig poo always is after washing out the pig sties (is that how you spell it?). being pretty much liquid it seemed efficiency was poor....at least in other peoples systems. Hey Ganoderma, yes, I think pig poo is mostly like liquid and might be much harder to char. In that case, it would probably need to be dried or reduced to a consistency where pyrolysis would be feasible. There's an article I have called "Magic Coal from the Steam Cooker," which uses wet material for carbonization. I think there's a link for the pdf in one of the older terra preta threads here. Maybe that would work for pig poo. not sure how it would work with human systems as there is lost of non human waste flushed down the toilet...wonder if tissue is ok in these systems...i assume it would be fine...but i cant see all the plastic and chemicals helping anything. at least with farming waste it is more or less clean poo...at least in the sense there is no litter. I think tissue should be fine, but what would not be wanted in char would be leftover heavy metals or toxic chemical residues. If plastics were pyrolyzed, they might let off toxic fumes, and those would need to be dealt with...but I'm not sure if things like chlorine, fluorine, or other possibly hazardous elements might remain in the charcoal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted September 27, 2009 Report Share Posted September 27, 2009 btw, Ganoderma, are you aware of what kind of wee beasties--the soil microbes--are in your biochar mix? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipse Now Posted September 27, 2009 Report Share Posted September 27, 2009 I've been a peak oiler for about 5 years now, wondering how we were going to survive running out of oil. Now while I have great hope for things like "Better Place" electric cars (with battery swap stations in addition to your normal charging routines) being able to replace some of our suburban driving, I've been wondering how much Biochar could offset our liquid fuel needs in other larger vehicle applications, like harvesters. So it seems crazy to me to waste half our syngas on powering the next biochar burn! Shouldn't we have a solar-thermal plant to at least cook the biomass so we can store and use 100% of the syngas for the rural community's transport needs? It will require some creative thinking to get through the years ahead, and we'll have to have all sorts of liquid fuels prioritised to various industries while you and I, as Mr & Mrs suburbia, either buy a Better Place EV or a pushbike! Anyway, your thoughts on solar powered biochar plants? Cheers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted September 27, 2009 Report Share Posted September 27, 2009 I've been a peak oiler for about 5 years now, wondering how we were going to survive running out of oil. Now while I have great hope for things like "Better Place" electric cars (with battery swap stations in addition to your normal charging routines) being able to replace some of our suburban driving, I've been wondering how much Biochar could offset our liquid fuel needs in other larger vehicle applications, like harvesters. So it seems crazy to me to waste half our syngas on powering the next biochar burn! Shouldn't we have a solar-thermal plant to at least cook the biomass so we can store and use 100% of the syngas for the rural community's transport needs? It will require some creative thinking to get through the years ahead, and we'll have to have all sorts of liquid fuels prioritised to various industries while you and I, as Mr & Mrs suburbia, either buy a Better Place EV or a pushbike! Anyway, your thoughts on solar powered biochar plants? Cheers. Solar-powered biochar plants sound like a better use of the potential energy than I've heard with some other solar projects. Although I originally had a lot of excitement over PV/solar cells the last few years, I realized that solar cells aren't necessarily the best options available for harnessing or harvesting solar energy. With most of them only catching the visible wavelengths and missing most of the infrared, UV, etc., we only end catching a minority of the total energy, when we should be focused on collecting as much as possible. And this can be easily done by turning solar energy --> heat, and then harnessing that heat to do work, like what you mention with frying biochar and collecting syngas from it. Look, ma, no fossil fuels required. I think EVs might hit a snag on lithium, because of its rarity and geopolitical complexities (you know, estimated 50% of it is sitting in Bolivia). Let's consider ourselves lucky that we have some. However, if tomorrow's vehicles have flexibility to use at least a couple different liquid fuels or hybrid tech, we may not be in such bad shape. I'm more worried about wars, crop failures/famines, and water shortages than whether I can drive to work or not. I'm still fit enough to bike...and I could bike most places if given enough time and a King-Kong-sized water bottle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipse Now Posted September 28, 2009 Report Share Posted September 28, 2009 Yeah, agreed, war over the remaining oil and agricultural collapse if farmers can't adjust quick enough to the new energy 'thang' are definitely the scarier scenarios. But if we can roll out electric transport like trolley buses fast enough we may not need cars (trolley buses are 5 times cheaper than trams apparently). But why would Lithium from Bolivia be harder than oil from S.A.? We deal with some pretty dodgie types in our search for resources and energy. Anyway, I'm in Australia and apparently we have lots of iron ore and *some* lithium (not sure how much) and could end up an EXPORTER of km's to the rest of the world. (If we see selling batteries as exporting km's, kind of like exporting oil, then Australia has a new export market to tap into one day if we can get our act together!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted September 28, 2009 Report Share Posted September 28, 2009 Yeah, agreed, war over the remaining oil and agricultural collapse if farmers can't adjust quick enough to the new energy 'thang' are definitely the scarier scenarios. But if we can roll out electric transport like trolley buses fast enough we may not need cars (trolley buses are 5 times cheaper than trams apparently). But why would Lithium from Bolivia be harder than oil from S.A.? We deal with some pretty dodgie types in our search for resources and energy. Anyway, I'm in Australia and apparently we have lots of iron ore and *some* lithium (not sure how much) and could end up an EXPORTER of km's to the rest of the world. (If we see selling batteries as exporting km's, kind of like exporting oil, then Australia has a new export market to tap into one day if we can get our act together!) From what I remember, Evo Morales isn't a fan of the USA and may regard the West as partaking in neocolonialism/exploitation. Bolivia and other places in Central and South America have long memories of getting screwed by Spain and the USA. I'm not sure about Bolivia. All I know is that the Bolivia and the US don't get along because of coca/cocaine issues and the War on Drugs. There's also a large reserve of lithium in seawater, but I'm not sure how one would extract it or whether it would be cost effective, like the lithium salt deposits that are currently mined. If so, that might ease the production and supply problems. Historically under Inca hands, Bolivia was a rich region and highly productive. And Bolivia *could be* a rich nation from agriculture, industry, and other things, and not just reliant on mining and fossil fuels... I've spent a lot of time reading about the ways the Incas did their agriculture, and it was quite ingenious. I'm really impressed. In general, as we see with terra preta/biochar, Amerindian agriculture was more advanced than most people give them credit for. There are vast reserves of energy we haven't fully tapped into whether it's solar, geothermal, biomass, or simply reducing wasted energy. We don't need to fight wars over oil or arable land or water if we made better use of what we already have. We need a paradigm shift. Too many misplaced priorities. Too many missed opportunities. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Getting A Life Posted September 30, 2009 Report Share Posted September 30, 2009 "We need a paradigm shift. Too many misplaced priorities. Too many missed opportunities." - Agreed. Economists are not too bright they do not see the big picture only the bottom line. It's up to science to make economically viable solutions to environmental problems as economists for the most part can't see past their noses. We are supposed to have the smarts - lets use them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipse Now Posted October 1, 2009 Report Share Posted October 1, 2009 There are vast reserves of energy we haven't fully tapped into whether it's solar, geothermal, biomass, or simply reducing wasted energy. We don't need to fight wars over oil or arable land or water if we made better use of what we already have. We need a paradigm shift. Too many misplaced priorities. Too many missed opportunities. I wonder? This used to be my original position, but now I'm questioning it.http://hypography.com/forums/engineering-and-applied-science/21007-can-we-build-baseload-renewable-grid.html#post280519 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted October 1, 2009 Report Share Posted October 1, 2009 "We need a paradigm shift. Too many misplaced priorities. Too many missed opportunities." - Agreed. Economists are not too bright they do not see the big picture only the bottom line. It's up to science to make economically viable solutions to environmental problems as economists for the most part can't see past their noses. We are supposed to have the smarts - lets use them. I spend a lot of time reading economist blogs and essays, to try to sharpen my mind for business and work, to better understand economics and the workings of an economy, and the recession/depression we're in. And the fluff and ignorance I run across is jaw-dropping. Yeah, this is why I chose science as my path. At least I can test and verify my guesses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted October 1, 2009 Report Share Posted October 1, 2009 I wonder? This used to be my original position, but now I'm questioning it.http://hypography.com/forums/engineering-and-applied-science/21007-can-we-build-baseload-renewable-grid.html#post280519 You'll see my response there. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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