[Digestion] Renewable Energy World biogas article

Sat Jan 8 03:11:30 CST 2011

Many thanks for the information. I would be interested in the commercial
package, since I am approached on this subject quite often
..randymott(at)ceeres.eu

Randy Mott

CEERES

Warsaw

From: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
[mailto:digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Anand Karve
Sent: Saturday, January 08, 2011 4:47 AM
To: For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion
Subject: Re: [Digestion] Renewable Energy World biogas article

Dear Randy,

I give below information about a small biogas plant developed by us. You can
contact me personally if you want commercial information.

Yours

A.D.Karve

ARTI biogas technology

Background

.         The organisms that produce biogas reside in the intestines of
animals. They exit from the animal body along with dung. 

.         The traditional biogas plants use dung as feedstock. 1 kg dung
produces about 20 to 30 litres biogas after a fermentation period of about a
month.

.         ARTI scientists argued that since these organisms lived in the
intestines, they ate what the animals ate.

.         Experiments with human food showed that 1 kg (dry weight) of human
food yielded 600 to 800 litres biogas within a fermentation period of just
24 hours.  

.         ARTI biogas system, based on human food waste, is about 600 to 800
times as efficient as the dung based biogas plant.  

Compact biogas plant by ARTI

.         Because of lower feedstock requirement, and because it is consumed
rapidly, ARTI biogas plant is small.  A 1000 litre digester is sufficient
for a family. 

.         Small size of the plant allows it to be accommodated in any
available space, even on the terrace of a house. 

.         Fabricated from locally available plastic water tanks, it is
installed in just a couple of hours. It can even be moved around. 

.         Food waste is plentifully available in urban areas from
restaurants, canteens, vegetable markets, fruit juice vendors, flour mills,
oil mills, etc. 

.         Therefore, technology is suitable for urban areas. Almost 5000
plants of this type have so far been installed in India and abroad.

Special features of ARTI biogas plant

.         Ideal technology for disposal of wet garbage. A 1000 litre plant
accepts daily about 2 kg wet garbage.

.         In nature, the methanogens get their food masticated by animals.
Therefore, food waste must be pulped before introducing it into the biogas
plant. 

.         About 10 litres water is needed daily as a carrier of the
feedstock. It generates daily 10 litres effluent. 

.         Because food waste gets completely converted into biogas, the
effluent is watery. It can be recycled or used for watering plants.

.         In the case of industrial canteens, hostels, resorts and housing
colonies, the design and size of biogas plants depend on the amount and type
of waste and the available space.

A rural biogas plant using green leaves as feedstock

.         Experiments with green leaves showed that 10 kg pulped green
leaves produced 800 to 1000 litres biogas.  

.         However, midribs, veins and petioles accumulate as undigested
debris inside the digester and ultimately choke the system.

.         A prototype has been developed from which the accumulated debris
can easily be removed without stopping biogas production. 

.         Such a plant can be introduced into rural areas, as growing a
leafy crop or plucking leaves from existing vegetation is possible. 

A method for green leaf production

.         50 to 100 sq.m.plot surounded by a skirting of transparent plastic
film is planted with a high yielding multicut fodder species. 

.         Effluent and leaf debris from the biogas plant provide nutrients
to this plot. Daily water requirement is between 5 to 8 litres per sq.m. 

.         1 or 2 sq.m.area is harvested daily. Leafy waste from crops like
cabbage, carrot, radish, and weeds from the field are also acceptable.

Purification of biogas

.         Biogas contains volumetrically about 40% carbon dioxide and 60%
methane.

.         Therefore biogas has a calorific value of only about 4000 kcal/kg
as against about 11000 kcal/kg of pure methane.

.         Storing biogas in a moving drum floating over water removes carbon
dioxide from biogas.

.         95% pure methane is obtained after 3 days.

Biogas as fuel in internal combustion engine

.         Biogas can replace 100% petrol or kerosene and 80% of diesel.

.         It is quite possible to use biogas in unpurified state in internal
combustion engines.

.         Using it in stationary engines for pumping water or for generating
electricity causes no problems. 

.         Using it as vehicular fuel is difficult, because it involves
compression of biogas and filling it into cylinders.  

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 3:48 PM, Randy Mott <randymott at ceeres.eu> wrote:

Can you send me info on small digesters? I have numerous friends asking me
who are building new homes or - in one case- a small group of homes.

Randy Mott

CEERES

Warsaw

From: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
[mailto:digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Warren
Weisman
Sent: Wednesday, January 05, 2011 1:24 AM
To: david at h4c.org; For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion
Subject: [Digestion] Renewable Energy World biogas article

Group all, 

Here's a article I wrote on the www.renewableenergyworld.com
<http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/>  website. Supposedly it's one of the
biggest on the internet, but a good introduction and overview of
biogas---no, I don't get extra money for everyone that visits the site. 

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/01/gas-from-the-pa
st-biogas-101

Just a reminder as we focus on the technical aspects of anaerobic digestion
there's still a lot of outreach to do to make biogas more widely understood
and adopted. 

Warren Weisman
Owner, HESTIA Home Biogas
Eugene, OR USA

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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/

-- 
***
Dr. A.D. Karve
President, Appropriate Rural Technology Institute (ARTI)

*Please change my email address in your records to: adkarve at gmail.com *

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