Posted on 12/22/2020 11:31:46 AM PST by Red Badger
An integrated biorefinery approach utilizing agriculture waste biomass to produce renewable biomethane along with other co-products (for soil amendment, nutrient recovery, and transportation biofuels). Credit: Nazih Kassem, with images from Cornell University, Department of Energy
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Cornell University is developing a system to extract energy from cattle manure to meet the campus's peak demands for heat in the winter months. In the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, scientists involved with the project give a detailed analysis of the issues required to make this work, including scientific, economic, and energy policy considerations.
The university is already involved in an initiative to develop renewable energy sources and services, with the goal of reducing its carbon footprint by 100% by 2035. These goals are proving difficult to achieve in cold regions, such as Ithaca, New York, where the university is located, since over six months of winter heating is needed for its buildings and laboratories.
Heating needs are a significant portion of Cornell's energy usage, and a challenge occurs at peak heating times. The university is developing a geothermal project that provides heat from hot water extracted 3-4 kilometers underground. This will provide adequate base-level heating but would be economically unattractive to meet peak demand.
To meet the need for more heat in the depths of winter, the investigators are proposing a system to convert cattle manure from the school's dairy farms, which house 600 cows, to methane and other products. The method employs a three-stage process, where the manure is first biologically digested with microbes to produce biogas, a mixture of carbon dioxide and methane.
This is followed by a second stage that converts the digested manure into a type of biocrude oil plus a substance called hydrochar that makes a good soil amendment.
The final stage combines the carbon dioxide generated in the first step with hydrogen gas produced by renewable electrolysis of lake water to biologically generate renewable natural gas, RNG. This final product can be injected into the natural gas grid for New York state, in much the same way electricity from wind turbines and solar panels is returned to the electrical grid.
"The proposed system will produce about 909 million liters of RNG per year," said author Nazih Kassem. "This can provide 97% of the total annual peak heating demand. The remainder can be met by purchasing natural gas, increasing Cornell's dairy herd size, or using campus eateries' food wastes for co-digestion. Adding 19 more dairy cows would result in enough RNG production to meet the average annual peak heating demand."
The investigators' detailed economic analysis revealed the importance of state policies regarding the RNG price and other issues.
"If New York state were to adopt policies to create a carbon market and enable competitive RNG pricing, then the proposed biomass peak heating system would show profitability," Kassem said.
Explore further New York State can achieve 2050 carbon goals: Here's how More information: "Sustainable district energy integrating biomass peaking with geothermal baseload heating: A case study of decarbonizing Cornell's energy system," Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy (2020). aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0024841
Journal information: Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy
Provided by American Institute of Physics
Need to send them some as a donation.
Eric Swallwell is happy
They are doing this now in rural parts of the developing world.
Nothing new under the sun.....
Well when you ban fracking, can’t burn coal, and the sun rarely shines....
“Who runs BarterTown?”
Why don’t they just hit up the ChiComs for more money?
I remember seeing on TV years ago that some Indian or Bangladeshi villages were doing this, only it was much simpler device, that supplied cooking / heating gas to the villagers’ homes.................
The Democratic platform can keep us going for decades.
“Far above Cayuga’s waters
There’s an awful smell
Some say it’s Cayuga’s waters
Some say it’s Cornell”
Perfect comment!
I can spare some as well.
LOL!.....................
Well ... shit....
DC should be able to supply the power for the whole country.
As any old Cornellian could relate, this would not be a new environmental concern.
Traditional song...
“Far above Cayuga’s waters
Comes an awful smell
Some say it’s Cayuga’s waters
Others say Cornell”
several variants exist
;>)
oh jeepers- not this crap again- :) (someone one lame like me had to say it)
Big feedlot operations and municipal sewage systems have been looking for better ways to handle the waste stream for decades. Anaerobic digester work but they're not commercially viable without deep subsidy. In principle, every municipal sewage treatment plant could be a biorefinery producing biofuels and other recycled products. Again, the issue is doing it at scale in a way that's commercially viable. I still think that eventually we'll have the right enzymes and the right microbial or algal agents, very likely bioengineered, to get the job done, but I don't know how close we are.
This still deserves a serious research effort because the waste streams have to be handled one way or another, since the traditional technology of pumping sewage into the nearest river is now off the table. The wastewater can be treated but the solid residue still must be disposed of. Perhaps we could spread sewage and manure on the streets of San Francisco as an urban composting project. The powers that be in SF seem to be ok with this sort of thing, and it could be a local and even regional solution, if we could pipe it in. But California is probably a special case; I don't think this would get much traction nationally.
With all the feces emitted by their leftist faculty, they should be in good shape for years.
Install this system in Congress. Plenty of raw material for it there.
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