Biogas is a renewable fuel produced by the breakdown of organic matter equivalent to meals scraps and animal waste. It can be utilized in a wide range of ways together with as vehicle fuel and for heating and electricity generation. Read on to learn more.
What is biogas? How is biogas produced?
Biogas is an environmentally-friendly, renewable energy source.
It’s produced when organic matter, reminiscent of food or animal waste, is broken down by microorganisms within the absence of oxygen, in a process called anaerobic digestion. For this to take place, the waste material needs to be enclosed in an environment where there isn’t a oxygen.
It might occur naturally or as part of an industrial process to deliberately create biogas as a fuel.
What kind of waste can be used to produce biogas?
A wide number of waste materials breaks down into biogas, together with animal manure, municipal garbage/ waste, plant material, meals waste or sewage.
Which gases does biogas include?
Biogas consists mainly of methane and carbon dioxide. It might additionally embody small quantities of hydrogen sulphide, siloxanes and a few moisture. The relative quantities of those differ relying on the type of waste involved within the production of the ensuing biogas.
What can biogas be used for?
To fuel vehicles – if biogas is compressed it can be used as a vehicle fuel.
As a replacement for natural gas – if biogas is cleaned up and upgraded to natural gas standards, it’s then known as biomethane and can be utilized in an identical way to methane; this can include for cooking and heating.
Biogas: 6 fascinating info
1. Biogas is a gas of many names
Biogas is most commonly also known as biomethane. It’s also typically called marsh gas, sewer gas, compost gas and swamp gas within the US.
Biogas is a naturally occurring and renewable source of energy, resulting from the breakdown of natural matter. Biogas is to not be confused with ‘natural’ gas, which is a non-renewable source of power.
2. Biogas and biomass: similarities and differences
Biomass and biogas are each biofuels; they are often burnt to produce energy. But biomass is the strong, natural material. Biomass has been used as an energy supply since humans first discovered fire and burnt wood, plants and animal dung to create energy.
Right now, many power stations run by burning a biomass of compressed wood pellets – a by-product of timber and furniture-making. By changing fossil-fuel coal, biomass enables renewable electricity to be produced.
3. Biogas is just not a new discovery
The anaerobic process of decomposition (or fermentation) of organic matter has been taking place in nature for millions of years, even earlier than fossil fuels, and continues to occur all around us within the natural world. Right this moment’s industrial conversion of natural waste into energy in biogas plants is simply fast-forwarding nature’s ability to recycle its useful resources.
The primary human use of biogas is thought thus far back to 3,000BC in the Center East, when the Assyrians used biogas to heat their baths.
A 17th century chemist, Jan Baptist van Helmont, discovered that flammable gases might come from decaying natural matter. Van Helmont is also accountable for bringing the word ‘gas’, from the Greek word chaos, into the science vocabulary.
The primary massive anaerobic digestion plant dates back to 1859 in a leper colony in Bombay.
An creative Victorian engineer, John Webb from Birmingham, created the Sewage Lamp, which converted sewage into biogas to light avenue lamps. The only remaining Webb Sewer Lamp in London is now just off The Strand in Carting Lane – or as some wags would have it, Farting Lane.
Anaerobic digestion was used as a means to deal with municipal wastewater, before chemical treatments. In the developing world the anaerobic process is still recognised as an inexpensive, natural alternative to chemical compounds and the reduction of dysentery bacteria.
And let’s not overlook that in Mad Max Past Thunderdome the put up-apocalyptic settlement Bartertown, run by Tina Turner’s terrifying Aunty Entity, is powered by a pig-farm biogas system with biogas used to power the desert-chasing vehicles.
4. At this time China leads the world in the use of biogas
China has the biggest number of biogas plants, with an estimated 50 million households using biogas. These are mostly in rural areas and small-scale residence and village plants.
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