Saturday, 26 November 2011

POO POWER! Part 1: Cars powered by poo!

For those of you who like to drive but are concerned about the rising costs of fuel and environmental issues around its production, this is for you!

This video and this news article in the Guardian explains all!



A water treatment plant in Bristol, part of the Wessex Water group of companies, is producing methane from human waste flushed down the loo! The biogas could resolve some sustainability issues around fuel for cars, as the man at the end of the video says:

 "As long as there are people, cows and chickens, they'll be methane."

I agree...

However! Even though biogas is sustainable and is beneficial in terms of dealing with increasing amounts of waste that we will produce, the fundamental problem is the fact that it is still a form of combustion; combustion = CO2

So, on the one hand it's sustainable and uses the methane that would otherwise contribute a more to global warming in the short term. On the other, it doesn't address the underlying dependence on carbon dioxide producing processes which will inevitably exacerbate climate change. 

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