Biomass is Renewable Energy; there's lots of it around.
Okay okay, so what is the stuff anyway?... Its any Organic Material we use as an energy source – a synthetic fuel. Incidentally, every last molecule of it contains solar energy. Actually, Biomass is the oldest source of energy known to man. Obviously, it’s renewable, because we’ve used some kind of biopower to cook our food and heat our homes for thousands of years. Currently, it provides approximately 3% of the total energy used in the United States, and 47% of the renewable energy used. How do we use it? We burn it, ferment it, convert it, chemically alter it, and let bacteria do their thing with it. How many types are there? Basically five… our Garbage or MSW (Municipal Solid Waste); Landfill Biogas; Wood and Wood Waste; Agricultural based Crops and their Residue, and Alcohol and Biodiesel Fuels, but depending on how you look at it, biofuel sources are almost endless. It’s actually versatile stuff: you can convert solids into gas or burn them, produce alcohol from a plant or make compost, heat our homes or make steam for electricity. The energy needed and resources available, determines the best use. Farm generated materials may be from Crops, one of the two types of Crop Residue, like Corncobs or Plant Leaves and Roots, and Animal dung. Then there’s ordinary Weeds, Lawn Clippings and organic waste from Kitchens. The solids may be a variety of Wood waste and general Municipal Solid Waste, Garbage dumped into a landfill from thousands of homes. All are producers of vast quantities of Methane Gas. Home owners can convert waste wood, weeds into Alcohol. All have great biopower capability. In summery: just as the number of Biomass materials and substances are endless, so too are their uses. And because there’s so much of it, we need to manage it. Soooo, what exactly is it that we manage? This stuff...
Whatever, whenever, or however the stuff starts out, be it fibrous, solid, or liquid, no matter its shape or size – we can either use it to produce synthetic fuels or bury it. Okay, suppose we decide to bury it, let’s look at a typical landfill… where does it all comes from. The average 3 person household creates roughly 4900 pounds of garbage each year. Let’s break that down to one person. That’s 4.5 lbs a day, 31.5 lbs and 1638 lbs a year. Of that, approximately 34% is some kind of paper, 12% is food leftovers, 13% is yard waste, and about 6% is wood. The rest, 35% is inorganic. This does not include commercial waste. And there’s a down side - Methane Gas. It’s sad that most of it is simply wasted. One landfill may burn it off, while another simply allows it to vent into the atmosphere. Why? Because Biogas can’t compete with lower priced Natural Gas. But it's like I said, Biomass is everywhere. Links:  Custom Search
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