That’s interesting, I never knew compost could generate heat. I wonder if landfill dumps do, or could be made to.
Could any useful energy be extracted?
Carolyn
As a farm boy who OFTEN had the “pleasure” of forking manure, whether in dunging out a steer stable, or loading the contents of a manure pile onto a manure spreader for putting on the fields; I can assure you that considerable heat is generated in the decomposition of manure when in a moist, tightly-packed pile.
In some of my flights of fancy I have thought about building a new home, and at one end of it, outside the foundation, having a 25 ft. square pit dug about 10 or 12 ft. deep in the ground, and running pipe from my hot water furnace out to the pit and through a series of coils of pipe I would have placed around the middle of the pit. I would pack the pit with leaves every early fall as soon as they come off the trees. The furnace would circulate the water through the pipes, out to the coils in the pit, picking up the heat from the decaying leaves and carrying it back to the house and through the radiators in the rooms in the house. The only cost to me would be a few cents a day for the electricity to run the circulator.........and removing the old leaves in the spring and putting in fresh ones in the fall. If I used solar panels, even the electricity would be free.
I’ve never done this, but ain’t I about half smart for just thinking of it?
Don’t know if they are still trying it, but at one time, some greeners were trying to extract methane gas from old landfill dumps. Seems the methane was just seeping up out of the ground.
A quick search shows it is still being used.