[Digestion] In support of Biosystems

[Hoysall Chanakya]

Ny last post titled perpetual motion machine was meant to be encouraging. 
I was trying to promote the central idea and not criticise it.  My
suggestion is that when agree to start a biosystem as outlined there we
need to plan the scale at which we need to operate.  For a biosystem, when
we begin to account for energy and material losses, we soon understand
that it becomes resource-wise sustainable only at a certain scale.  At
smaller scales it would not seem to be operational or sustainable.  Once
this size is established and found possible, the next step is to examine
its economic sustainability.  In order to make it cost-wise sustainable,
the scale of operation usually needs to be somewhat larger than the size 
found acceptable to meet the resource-sustainability criteria.  This is
because a certain level of profits needs to be built in - (taking from
Paul Harris's concept of leakage accounting)  We will need to see at what
size all these leakages (an inputs) become viable /sustainable etc.




> G'day All,
>
> We do get on to some interesting topics!
>
> Of course there are losses in the integrated biosystem that have to be
> made
> up by rainfall, sunshine and gas transfer, plus whatever nutrients are
> exported in produce will eventually have to be made up (no, I'm not trying
> to restart a previous thread - please!). It depends where you draw the
> boundary and how tight the boundary is. I once gave a paper about
> Integrated
> biosystems and pointed out that Adelaide (where the Conference was) was a
> "loose" integrated biosystem as lot's of products crossed the boundary but
> Planet Earth is a "tight" integrated biosystem as very little enters or
> leaves the biosphere. I can't find that paper just now, but here is an
> Integrated Biosystems one if you want some brief information <
> http://www.adelaide.edu.au/biogas/website/integratedbiosys.pdf or
> PowerPoint
> http://www.adelaide.edu.au/biogas/website/IntegratedBiosystems.pdf>.
>
> Happy digesting,
> HOOROO
>
> Mr. Paul Harris, Room S116b, Waite Main Building Faculty of Sciences, The 
> University of Adelaide, Waite Campus, PMB 1, Glen Osmond SA 5064 Ph    :
> +61
> 8 8303 7880      Fax   : +61 8 8303 4386
> mailto:paul.harris at adelaide.edu.au  
> http://www.adelaide.edu.au/directory/paul.harris
>
> CRICOS Provider Number 00123M
> This email message is intended only for the addressee(s) and contains
> information that may be confidential and/or copyright.  If you are not the
> intended recipient please notify the sender by reply email and immediately
> delete this email. Use, disclosure or reproduction of this email by anyone
> other than the intended recipient(s) is strictly prohibited. No
> representation is made that this email or any attachments are free of
> viruses. Virus scanning is recommended and is the responsibility of the
> recipient.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
> [mailto:digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Hoysall
> Chanakya
> Sent: Sunday, 21 November 2010 10:04 PM
> To: For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion
> Subject: [Digestion] the perpetual motion machine
>
> The grand perpetual motion machine symptoms,
> Not really - what you need to see is that there will be losses and
> leakages from this "grand system" and to keep it running you need to
> reduce your energy losses to minimum and have practically no N losses.  At
> some scale your dream will come true.  Then of course comes the cost -->
> where you need to decide if it is worth it afterall.
> best wishes
> chanakya
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Digestion mailing list
>
> to Send a Message to the list, use the email address
> Digestion at bioenergylists.org
>
> to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page
> http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org
>
> for more information about digestion, see
> Beginner's Guide to Biogas
> http://www.adelaide.edu.au/biogas/
> and the Biogas Wiki http://biogas.wikispaces.com/
>
>
> --
> This message has been scanned for viruses and
> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> believed to be clean.
>
>


-- 
Dr. Hoysall Chanakya
Centre for Sustainable Technologies
(Assoc. Faculty at Centre for Infrastructure, Sustainable Transport and
Urban Planning (CiSTUP) and Centre for Contemporary Studies)
Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012
ph 91-80-2293 3046; fax-91 80 2360 0683


-- 
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.