There is energy in filth, and it's found in the sewers. Scientific approach to this unwanted dumps are turning heads now as scientists rush in their studies on how to extract energy from sewage.
Having a sewage system in a bustling metropolis could save millions of dollars in energy consumption, water pollution maintenance, air pollution maintenance, transportation fuel, dry cell manufacturing and other cost and direct benefits of extracting energy from sewage.
Quantifiable Carbon Dioxide emissions can be captured and prevented from being released into the atmosphere. Landfill maintenance will be avoided from being practiced in some parts of the globe, saving millions of dollars in the process. And it is environmentally friendly too.
One of the energies that could be generated from sewage is Electrical Energy. There is an electrical activity going on in the sewage involving bacteria. The chemical reactions stirred by bacteria releases electrical charges in the process. When bacteria breaks down sewage, electrons are generated. This electrons are utilized by microbial cells to convey electrical currents. Sewage treatment in large quantities could produce large amount of electricity that could power a considerable magnitude of electrical equipment.
Another source of energy that is extractable from sewage is by running electricity through it. The vapor that results in these process is then captured and condensed. The resultant condensed liquid is No.2 Diesel that is consumed to power diesel ran machineries and equipment. The beauty of this energy extraction method is that there is no toxic byproducts that is created.
The possibility of converting filth from the sewage will come to reality as there is now a technology that can turn this concept into reality. Mother Nature naturally produced fossil fuels that took her millions of years to generate. But when the parallel and sequential process was mimicked, similar results was reached in the very least time.
The process is called hydrothermal liquefaction. It is basically pressure cooking sewage to a temperature of 400 degrees C under high pressure and then drastically cooled down to 70 degrees C. Resultant product from the Sewage is very similar from that black gold pumped out from the ground. With a little mixture of Oxygen and Water, these new mineral when refined, could have a byproduct of diesel, and gasoline using the usual refinery operations, as stated by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.
