Teru Talk Newsletter
Volume IV, Issue
1, January 6,
2014
Teru Talk by Michael
Theroux (pronounced
"TerĂº")
Teru's Trash Talk
"If it's
wet, keep it wet. If it's
dry, keep it dry." That was
the sage advice handed out
by the EPA's long-standing
AgStar
program a number of
years ago, providing
core guidance for
selection of
technologies to convert
waste liabilities to
assets. That simple quip
has held true a large
part of the time for
selection of the core
waste conversion systems
and methods. The concept
combines a whole lot of
science-based common
sense - but don't bet
the farm on it. Too much
has changed; too many
new approaches are
proving the old ways no
longer hold
water.
In the
last decade the variety of
available systems for waste
conversion and the number
of functional reference
projects to surface
globally have both
increased dramatically.
Industrial and governmental
would-be project owners
have gone from a paucity of
possible solutions to an
overwhelming overload of
detailed systems and
methods information.
Nay-sayers can always point
to the failures, and there
have been far more losses
than gains. Clear-cut
choices are not easily
achieved and every waste
conversion pathways is
fraught with hazards.
Accurate information
remains awfully hard to
come by (except of course
in Teru Talk).
Waste can
be deconstructed to
constituent parts in any
number of ways, using
thermal energy, microbial
digestion, chemical
decomposition and kinetic
force either alone or in
combination. We whack
something with enough
energy, it tends to come
apart. How much value we
get out of any particular
waste conversion process
compared to the cost of the
energy we use to break the
bonds and separate the
components largely
determines the overall
economics of the process.
If you have to dry
feedstock slurry before
conversion, you expend
energy twice when compared
to "keeping it wet." If you
need to turn dry biomass
into slurry before wet
fermentation, well, it
would stand to reason
you've just paid for two
steps when one "keep it
dry" stage might have been
more
cost-effective.
OK, all
right - it's not that
simple and every rule was
only concocted to be
broken. If "wet to wet, dry
to dry" always held true,
we wouldn't be seeing such
success in use of feedstock
pre-treatment, or so many
new pre-treatment
approaches entering the
marketplace. Integrated use
of engine heat for "tump
drying" has become standard
practice; busting woody
biomass into a wood-sugar
soup means a far greater
range of feedstock has now
become available. Process
efficiency increases are to
be garnered wherever more
energy out is generated
than energy put into the
works, and incremental
improvements add up over
time.
It's all
a balancing act, and
engineering science
provides ways to assess
both the mass and the
energy balance. We know
that myriad conversion
machines run; now let's
tend to the individual
systems and process trains,
seeking mass and energy
balance efficiencies, and
see if we can make it all
more
cost-effective.
Hey
Rube!
One of the
most cost-effective approaches
we can incorporate is the
recovery and use of waste heat.
Reclaiming even just a little
of the heat thrown off of an
engine block can tip the
balance from loss to profit on
a project. Always, always "run
the numbers" for the mass and
energy balance as materials
change through the course of
processing, and seek out every
tiny efficiency improvement.
Once you are done, start
again.
This Week's Top Story
US EPA Rules
MaxWest's Sludge
Gasification System is Not
An
Incinerator
The US Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA)
has ruled that federal
emissions guidelines and
compliance rules for sewage
sludge incinerators do not
apply to a sludge gasifier
developed by Florida based
MaxWest Environmental Systems,
Inc.
01/03/2014
The
Week's News
USFS
Releases 2013 Technical
Report on 'Southern Forest
Futures
Project'
The US Forest Service’s (USFS)
Southern Research Station has
recently released its
2013-updated Technical Report
and Summary Report on the
Southern Forest Futures Project
(SFFP).
01/05/2014
EPA Releases
Proposed Rule for
Residential Wood Heater
Performance
The US Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) released a
detailed Pre-Publication Notice
on January 3, 2014 on
"Standards of Performance for
New Residential Wood Heaters,
New Residential Hydronic
Heaters and Forced-Air
Furnaces, and New Residential
Masonry Heaters."
01/04/2014
IET
Schedules Manchester Heat
Debate on Low Carbon Heating
Systems
The Institution of Engineering
and Technology (IET) has
scheduled the Manchester Heat
Debate for January 29, 2014 in
Manchester, United Kingdom, to
obtain knowledge and opinion
regarding the provision of low
carbon heating systems from
local stakeholders in the
Energy and Built Environment
sectors.
01/04/2014
Colorado
Spring's Drake Coal Plant
Starts Biomass Power
Co-Firing
Pilot
Colorado Springs Utilities
(CSU) began a biomass power
pilot project at its Martin
Drake Power Plant at the
beginning of the year to
determine the best co-firing
blend of woody biomass and
coal.
01/04/2014
MMPA's
Hometown BioEnergy Facility
in Minnesota Starts
Operations
Construction and commissioning
of the 8 MW Hometown BioEnergy
in Le Sueur County, Minnesota,
has been completed and the
facility is now operational.
01/03/2014
APL
Announces Major Version
Upgrade to GEK Gasifier Core
Technology
California based All Power Labs
(APL) has announced the new
v5.0 Gasifier Experimenter's
Kit (GEK) Gasifier and related
Power Pallet, representing a
generational change in its core
gasifier technology. 12/31/2013
UNR
Cooperative Extension Will
Test Large-Scale Biochar
Production and
Use
University of Nevada, Reno
(UNR) Cooperative Extension and
its partners have announced a
large-scale three-year project
to test biochar’s impact on
soil productivity and water
availability in Eureka County,
Nevada.
12/30/2013
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