Vaporizing Garbage into Gas

Every year so much garbage ends up in America’s landfills that we are becoming the Saudi Arabia of trash. These dumps emit more of the greenhouse gas methane than any other human-related source. The Atlanta-based company Geoplasma has created an innovative method of using plasma technology to turn rotting rubbish into usable power for up to 50,000 homes and at the same time reduce the amount of methane into the atmosphere.

Engineers have developed an efficient torch for blasting garbage with a stream of superheated gas, known as plasma. When trash is dropped into a chamber and heated to 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit, its organic components—food, fluids, paper—vaporize into a hot, pressurized gas, which turns a turbine to generate electricity. Steam, a by-product, can generate more. Inorganic refuse such as metals condense at the bottom and can be used in roadbeds and heavy construction.

Several small plasma plants exist around the world for industrial processes, but Geoplasma is constructing the first U.S. plasma refuse plant in St. Lucie County, Florida. The plant is scheduled to go online by 2011; it will process 1,500 tons of garbage a day, sending 60 megawatts of electricity to the power grid (after using some to power itself).

Emissions are far lower than in standard incineration, and the process reduces landfill volume and methane release. Power prices are projected to be on par with electricity from natural gas. The difference, says Ron Roberts, St. Lucie County’s assistant director of solid waste, is that “you’re getting rid of a problem and making it a positive.

Photo Credit: National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Future cityscapes?

Is this a sign of things to come?



It is a scary thought, but since this has already happened in Naples Italy, can the U.S. be far behind?

This, by the way, is not the result of striking garbage truck drivers, but simply, the result of the landfills being too full to accept any more. An estimated 5,000 tons has been building up since the closure on Dec 21, 2007, in Naples alone. The surrounding areas are filling up too.

We need to seriously curtail out wastefulness, and soon. Recycling has been talked about for several generations now and we are still far behind in our ability and willingness to actually participate.

According to a report from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the United States recycled 32 percent of its waste in 2005 (I don’t know why stats seem to never be less than two years old).

Including composting, Americans recycled 79 million tons of waste in 2005, a 2 percent increase over 2004 and a big jump from the 16 percent of waste Americans recycled in 1990 and the 10 percent of waste Americans recycled in 1980.

About 42 million tons of paper were recycled—a 50 percent recycling rate. That means 50 percent goes to the landfill.

The number of U.S. landfills have been decreasing steadily—from 8,000 in 1988 to 1,654 in 2005—but the capacity has remained relatively constant because new landfills are much larger.

Container and packaging recycling increased to 40 percent. That means 60 percent goes to the landfill.

America is making headway in both creating more recyclable products and actually recycling those products, but there is still room for improvement.

I see recyclable products thrown in trash cans on a daily basis. Just walk down any public street with trash cans and you will find plastic and other recyclable products in with the other trash. Unfortunately, you can also see this trash on the side of the road. I have never understood the mentality of someone who turns our environment into their own personal trash can by throwing their trash out the window.

Walk into any shopping mall, office building, airport, etc and you will find recyclable objects thrown in with the trash. Sometimes there is even a recycling container nearby.

In my own neighborhood, where we have blue recycling bins assigned to every household, I see, on trash day, too many homes where that blue recycling bin sits up at the side of the house obviously empty while the recycling truck drives past.

We just are not fully committed to recycling in the U.S. yet. Is it going to take the visual sights and olfactory smells of rotting garbage in our streets before non-participants finally realize they should have done their part?