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8 comments

Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

Posted January 30, 2010 7:43 AM

The U.S. Army is investing a lot of time and money into turning garbage into diesel fuel for both vehicles and generators. The amount fuel used overseas is tremendous: more than 68 million gallons of fuel every month; and transporting fuel is very dangerous. But the gasification process itself is complex, let alone trying to manage it from a miliatry installation in a combat zone. Is this a wise investment for the military at this time? Is it possible to make a gasification project that can work in the field? What about EPA sulfur content regulations, and other environmental issues? Will the commercial sector eventually benefit from the research?

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Power-User

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#1

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/30/2010 10:37 PM

Use Plasma Gasification to turn trash into fuel (and generate power at the same time). Ft. Belvoir has been using Plasma Gassification for several years.

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Anonymous Poster
#4
In reply to #1

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/31/2010 11:42 AM

Westinghouse was into this years back - it is not easy - uses fantastic amounts of electrical power and in my opinion is useless in a military situation.

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Power-User

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#6
In reply to #4

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/31/2010 2:59 PM

It was used to get rid of poison gasses. It worked great.

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Guru
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#2

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/30/2010 11:33 PM

I suspect, in a combat zone, EPA's concerns are going to be very, very low on the priority list...

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Guru
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#3

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/31/2010 11:07 AM

The problem is not with the combat zone but the assembly and recreational areas. The infrastructure is (usually) not available to dispose of tons of waste generated everyday by soldiers ans staff.

They presently burn the the trash but is uses fuel ans makes a lot of smoke indicating your position to the ennemy...

Using plasma torches to convert part of the trash into energy seems a very good idea even if it is more complex than burning it.

As far as complexity is concerned, I hope that people entrusted with all kind of high technology weapons will be able to take care of the high tech toilets...

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Guru
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#5
In reply to #3

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/31/2010 11:44 AM

There are actually companies out there that are doing plasma trash converters in "mobile" packages. There have been some significant environmental objections to this technique, but what many environmentalists fail to recognise is that any method of trash disposal is going to involve trade-offs. Conventional inceneration, landfills, dumping in the ocean, even recycling cause their own problems, some of which are hidden for very extended periods (i.e., chemical leaching into the aquifer from landfills). One must evaluate not only the environmental impact of the process under consideration, but also how any alternative process might either improve on or be more detrimental to the environment...Plasma inceneration offers a number of advantages (i.e., reclaiming recyclable materials) that far outweigh some of the issues when compared to other options.

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Guru
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#7
In reply to #5

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

01/31/2010 8:49 PM

I am all for it!

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Associate

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#8
In reply to #5

Re: Is the Army Talking Trash about Trash?

02/01/2010 1:14 PM

If getting use from trash is the objective(not an issue to the military mission)the process is simple(or can be made simple). This requires good engineering but its not rocket science and can eliminate most if not all of the trash now being deposited in landfill.

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