CB, here's a better idea, which I've just made up, so it might need some fine tuning. But it does have some sound scientific and engineering principles which were proven in my BP Oil days.
Anyway, I think that there is a huge market for waste plant parts to be superfinely ground with water into a mixture of 30% water, 70% plant silt, to make furnace fuel.
I suspect it might be fairly stable in density as wet wood is borderline buoyant and when finely macerated should form a nice neutral suspension. That would be important so you don't get a layer of water and a layer of mostly wood.
A small stirrer would ensure a constant mixture.
That mix could be injected through normal nozzles and it would burn beautifully and cleanly. With water, combustion is enhanced.
Even with 30% water content, there would be only a 3% loss of energy by evaporation as proven in BP Oil's orimulsion trials in furnaces.
It might even work in large engines [such as marine diesels or power stations], but I'd try it out in a regular furnace first.
For example, after a huge wheat field has been harvested, there is a LOT of cellulose left over which is I guess dug back into the ground, or burned off or something. Same in forestry. When the trunks are taken, there's a LOT of offcut. Around cities, there is a LOT of tree pruning [in Auckland trees grow like crazy and it's a problem keeping them down]. All that waste could go straight into the mincer and furnace.
There might need to be some biocides used as it would all start to rot and ferment if left too long. Which wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing as the production of ethanol from wood waste would supply vehicles. The Forest Research Institute in Rotorua was making ethanol from trees 25 years ago - it was never economic of course as oil was too cheap. But it can be done.
Anyway, there's some food for thought and a business opportunity for anybody who can be bothered.
The ash could be spread back over the land to restore mineral levels if that's an issue. Maybe there would need to be lots of fixed nitrogen to keep the plants growing. Australia is just begging for vast fuel-producing forests to be planted. It just need some water, which could be supplied by photovoltaics splitting salt water, to H2 and O2 which could be burned to generate electricity and pumped to the forests as water.
That would only work if the trees were much cheaper than the photovoltaics, which would be like a loss leader to get the cheap stuff. Otherwise, the photovoltaics might as well just be spread across the deserts instead of trees.
Or supertankers of water could be brought from rivers around the world. There's no shortage of fresh water at places such as Manapouri in New Zealand. Backload water to Australia and fill up with oil to come back [for efficient transport].
Mqurice |
