How to Reduce CO2 Emissions?

Pump the exhaust to an underground evenly distributed network releasing into the soil...

What might be the unintended consequences of such a scheme?

None that I know of...If properly distributed to raise the PPM count to optimum amount, any plant growth will become more drought resistant, experience more robust growth, bear larger fruit...This is a scheme used in commercial greenhouses...

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_do_increased_CO2_levels_affect_plant_growth

We are near the coast near the Gulf. We are only a few feet above sea level. Pumping into the ground = pumping into ground water. Algae blooms, environmental concerns, fish kills. . . I'm not sure we will go that rout.

Then again, you ARE in Florida. . . does this work in your area?

-A-

Well I don't know what methods of release are being used, ie; near ground level, near surface, greenhouse....but I do know it is being used as a pilot project for algae production using exhaust from some power plants, where the algae is grown in glass tubes...The ideal setup I guess would be to produce a crop of some sort, be it fruits, flowers, or some other C3 type vegetation...The idea being to use the CO² as a feedstock to some value added product....

If someone found a way to make this profitable, we might GIVE them the CO₂ and lease a small corner of property to set up their facility.

I have yet to see someone actually make money at this though.

-A-

True, most likely this would be a research pilot plant project of some sort, but there is a lot of research and money being pumped into this area...

The conversion of CO² to formic acid and carbon monoxide do seem to have commercial appeal, as potential solutions...

Found this....

"

Mantra Venture Group: Carbon Recycling with ERC

In November 2007, Mantra Venture Group Ltd.^[7] acquired a chemical processing technology developed by the University of British Columbia's Clean Energy Research Center, entitled the Electroreduction of Carbon Dioxide (ERC).^[8] Powered by electricity, ERC combines captured carbon dioxide with water to produce high value materials that are conventionally obtained from the thermochemical processing of fossil fuels, including: formic acid, formate salts, oxalic acid, and methanol.

Rather than worry about the impacts and properties of CO₂, ERC harnesses its useful properties and transforms the gas into several useful and valuable by-products.

ERC first proved itself as a legitimate alternative to CCS in October 2008 through Mantra Energy's completion of the first ERC prototype. The prototype, capable of converting 1 kg of CO₂ into formic acid per day, was revealed to the public later that month at the Sustainability 2008 conference held in Vancouver, BC. ERC received its first grant under the National Research Council's Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC - IRAP) in May 2009, and the technical staff has since been focused on increasing the cathode life, reducing formate cross-over to retrieve formate from the catholyte solution, and optimizing the reactor with respect to its use in processes for the electrosynthesis of formate/formic acid. Considerable progress has been made in this effort, and in July 2009 the ERC reactor reached new heights by increasing its current efficiency to 89.66% (up from 46.24%) through the use of a new proprietary catalyst structure. With political and regulatory concern for CO₂ mitigation reaching an all-time high, the timing for ERC could not be better. In June, the IEA predicted the price of carbon emissions must rise to $180/tonne by 2030 to meet greenhouse gas reduction targets. In addition, the market price of formic acid is also on the rise and is expected to hit $1,440/tonne by year-end. These increasing market values, coupled with the many government grant and incentive programs for carbon recycling and CCS, indicate a very bright future for ERC. (Sethuraman, 2009). The ERC technology was co-invented by Professor Emeritus Colin Oloman and Hui Li at the University of British Columbia's Clean Energy Research Center (CERC). Mantra Energy later acquired the 100% outright ownership of the technology from the CERC in November 2007. The technology is currently Patent pending worldwide, under the PCT Patent Application WO2007/041872 "Continuous co-current electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide.""

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrochemical_reduction_of_carbon_dioxide

Check this...

"To be considered a viable carbon recycling technology, one must prove that the technology has a negative net carbon balance - meaning the carbon output during the conversion process is less than amount of carbon being converted. In August 2009, Mantra Energy completed a preliminary carbon balance report on its ERC technology, entitled "Possible Reactions Related to Carbon Credits - ERC Process of Mantra Energy."

In completing the analysis, it was determined that one tonne of formic acid formed through ERC effectively "sequesters" approximately 0.95 tonnes of CO₂. Assuming that the formic acid is then incorporated into compounds with a long lifetime (as is the plan for ERC), the resulting formic acid is considered a green product. When powered by sustainable electricity, the ERC process would then carry a net gain of +0.95 CO₂ credits per tonne of formic acid formed. Furthermore, it was noted that when the formic acid is used to substitute another fossil-based compound, additional "replacement credits" can be obtained. For example, Mantra Energy has previously identified formic acid as a key replacement for hydrochloric acid (HCI) in industrial processes such as steel pickling. By substituting HCI with formic acid generated through ERC, it was determined that Mantra Energy would generate +0.95 carbon credits for the conversion of CO₂ to formic acid, plus an additional +2.53 credits for replacing HCI from a conventional source. Thus, a total of +3.48 CO₂ credits would be generated per tonne of formic acid produced. In benefiting from both sequestered and replacement credits, preliminary calculations showed that ERC could generate as much as 5.98 carbon credits per tonne of reactant formed. The negative carbon balance scenarios identified through this preliminary report are very encouraging. Mantra Energy expects to achieve even further improvements to its carbon balance throughout the current set of development trials with Kemetco Research Inc., and the company will complete a formalized carbon balance study upon completion of the development project."

Great idea, it might be doable with the wind farm idea posted below. The renewable energy part is the hang-up. Extra HCL might be an issue. i will definitely put this one in the hat.

-A-

Some more info...

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11655-climate-myths-higher-co2-levels-will-boost-plant-growth-and-food-production.html

http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/CO2plants.htm

There is already a huge experiement going on in Morgan COunty, Illinois to determine just that. They are modifying a coal fired plant to capture the exhaust gasses, then injecting that 4,000 feet into the ground into shale layers. They will track the dispersion of the CO2 as well as the percolation to higher layers. This is a $ 1 B experiment!

I would have preferred that they convert the burners to plasma torches to reduce emmisions of CO2. That would probably cost more like $ 250 M.

Not a very out-of-the-box idea, but have you thought of picking up a CO₂ scrubbing turnkey?

Which kind do you have in mind?

One company in particular that comes to mind (though I'm sure there are a ton of others) is The Linde Group that employ a pretty basic system into turnkey operations.

They have a couple reference plants listed:

1

2

But it's hard to say how much such a system would cost without contacting them (or a different company directly). The a couple of the more common types of separators (to help with your search) are PSA (pressure swing adsorption) and croygenic oxygen separators.

Plant trees wherever you can. Just don't burn any of them.

Depending where you are in Texas, water may be an issue.

How much offset do you think we could get from trees per acre?

tonnes / year / acre ?

-A-

It depends on the type of tree planted, but 4 lbs per tree per year is a good starting point. Planted on a typical 4ft x 4ft grid, this comes to roughly 5 1/2 tons/year/acre.

That's a start!! All I need are 1800 acres of trees to meet my goal.

Not a final solution, but we may in fact be planting trees in the near future.

Thanks!

-A-

Get your lobbyist to work on this:"the Texas Legislature over the past several years that provide significant tax incentives for planting trees on agricultural open-space lands and on timber lands that have been harvested promote the cause of forest regeneration and augments tree planting efforts in the state."

"One acre of trees annually consumes the amount of carbon dioxide equivalent to that produced by driving an average car for 26,000 miles. That same acre of trees also produces enough oxygen for 18 people to breathe for a year."- New York TimesHow

From: Much Oxygen Does One Tree Produce?

I don't know if bamboo grows where you are, but it grows incredibly fast (I imagine this translates to a higher rate of co2 absorption vs. trees). I noted in another post you can expect about a 6% roi for harvesting trees, but I haven't a clue as to the rate you could get with bamboo.

Just throwing it out there.

I'm betting if you sent an email to one of the universities near you someone would be willing to offer up some good advice on the right species and thumb rules for their uptake.

I will include bamboo with the tree consideration. Thank you!

-A-

Has the facility completed an energy audit and followed through on the output from it?

What is the energy audit re-evaluation interval?

Yes, we preform an annual energy audit. We have an energy reduction team. I am fishing for out of the box ideas. Broaden the question and challenge the state of the art. All that sort of thing.

Think of it as a thought experiment. . .

-A-

What does <...10³ metric tonnes / yr ...> represent as a percentage of current emission?

Do you have cows in your 900 acres of land?

Cows and other ruminants have four stomachs, the first of which, called the rumen, is where the trouble lies; bacteria in the rumen produce methane. Scientists -- mostly in Australia, New Zealand and Britain, where the problem is taken a lot more seriously than it is here -- are working on a variety of technical solutions, including a kind of bovine Alka-Seltzer. Scientists are also trying to develop new varieties of feed grasses that are more energy efficient and thus generate less methane, and they are experimenting with targeted breeding to produce a less-gassy strain of cattle.

This stuff looks promising. The sequestered CO2 could possibly be sold to the beverage industry or to industrial users of CO2.

Phantom, vampire, stand by or what ever you want to call it. Some of the older devices in this mode can draw substantial power. Limiting those can be a plus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standby_power

Least not forget to include the elephant in the room.

Nature produces, recycles, sequesters around 720 billion tons annual with a +- annual variation of some 50 -75 billion tons itself where as us humans are producing around 28 - 30 billion tons annually.

As far as I still understand math 30 < 50 and natures seems to not have much trouble on the long term dealing with the 50 -75 billion ton surplus's it occasionally produces over the seasonal averages.

Personaly I think you will just tossing good profits and customers money after more bad politics. I for one do not want your product if I have to pay more for it because you went 'green' just to satisfy enviropolitic mandates that are well known for not having their facts or true intentions in order.

Although I tend to agree with the bulk of that comment, planting trees isn't bad business. Many insurance companies are invested in forests because of the long term steady pay off of roughly 6%. Given todays interest rates, 6% isn't all that bad! If there is an extra 600 acres "going to waste", it should lower rates (in theory anyhow).

I am not against planting trees either but I hope that someone does an honest study of what trees will be planted and if they will actually grow on their own well enough to justify their existence in that climate and soil conditions.

Good natural healthy local trees yes! High maintenance low return political trees heck no.

Very good point. It reminds me of the political trees planted back in my home town. A politician running for mayor decided to have a big community rally to plant an enormous number of trees on a large plot of city property. The species chosen was ill suited for our climate. As it turned out, all but one died because the city only maintained one (guess who's?).

He won by the way.

I don't know if you actually read my OP, but I specifically wanted to stay away from this argument. I'm on your side of this argument. I'm looking for creative (constructive) suggestions for meeting a requirement that has been handed to me. I didn't come up with this on my own.

I have looked into getting credit for our warehouse roof. The greenies want us all to paint all our roofs white to reflect light back into space. Well, we have a warehouse roof that is already white and has more than 10k m^2. If I can get carbon credit for that it would be awesome. I can tell the greenies about all the efforts we have made to save the polar bears without spending a dime.

I know what team I'm on and I'm in the game. I'll leave it to others to sit on the side lines and b1t(h.

-A-

I think the "Elephant" is having more trouble dealing with CO2 than you think.

http://www.weather.com/news/noaa-april-report-20120508

Of course, there will always be people living in denial, and it's not worth the CO2 to try and convince them otherwise.

It looks to me, that the Questioner forgot the most basic question. HE, HIMSELF could do without. I do not mean reducing this, substituting that. Meaning HIM DOING WITHOUT ENTIRELY. He want to reduce, ok. Let him design it without. Difficult? Tough! All good solutions are tough.

Get used to it.

Go passive, plant trees, enioy a rustic life. And get over having a PMS late in life. Sorry, I simply got tired of late-in-the life PMS cases.

Outside of direct methods: reducing the CO2 output of the boiler, and/or various means of managing the CO2 produced by the boiler...

The 600 some acres you have could provide a significant dent by duel-purposing it with both trees and wind turbines.

Over 600 acres, you can fit about 200 3 Megawatt turbines... that's 600 MW of CO2-off-setting electricity... that's enough to supply electricity to an excess of 500,000 homes... or your facility.

I think that makes up for your boiler :-)

Not sure about your surrounding infrastructure... but for your reference... a 3 MW wind turbine would be in the order of magnitude of 400-425 feet overall height with about a 300 foot rotor diameter. So, you have to consider the NIMBY effect.

Round out the property by planting trees wherever you can that do not interfere with the operation/maintenance of the turbines.

And, with proper negotiations with local governments and utility companies, the costs of the instillation can be shared.

I'm actually getting ready to relocate to Texas here in the near future, so I'm interested in how this pans out for you and what your ultimate course of action was. Keep us posted.

Kind of outside the box and I like it.

How about: Don't produce the energy with any carbon hydrate. Wind is one option. Maybe the sun is. What do you think about taking up a contract with the local electricity plant, only buy "Green" energy or any energy that is there and let somebody else produce the CO2 for you. In out of box terms you will reduce your CO2 output.

I think the idea should be not to produce it and not to reduce it!

Thats just a general thought.

Think about it.

GA for Java Head

We are looking into turbines. The problem we have down here is that the local wind speeds are between 0 and 10 mph most of the time. Of course, there are occasional local maximas of over 130 mph. Gulf Coast you know. . .

-A-

I have a couple options for you.

I will start with an easy one. Convert the system from HPSteam to High Temp Hot Water (basically- water at essentially steam temperature but under enough pressure that it does not turn to steam).

Right now, with that level of steam pressure, you are operating at best about 50 to 55% fuel-to-steam efficiency and you are losing about 20% of the pounds of water you are turning into steam (flash losses at the condensate return tanks, losses at the deaerator and blow down). And that does not include ANY losses due to trap failures. All of those water losses are also huge energy losses. Energy losses equate to CO2 (and smog making NOx) generation.

The cost of the change-out is about $20-25,000 (a little re-piping, control change from pressure to temperature, and pumps). You do not even need to change-out the traps because the water will pass right through. IF you really need steam for a process, you can put in a relatively inexpensive flash tank to make it and return the condensate to the return water main.

You will then be operating at about 82% efficiency with a much smaller water bill. You can "run the numbers" but burning natural gas generates 117.08 pounds of CO2 for every MMBTU you burn. So- if you are running about 15 MMBTUH now at, say 52% and you get to 82%, you will be burning about 10 MMBTUH, saving 5 x 8760 = 43,800 MMBTU x 117.08 / 2200 or 2,330 metric tonnes annually.

Second- I know of a totally new version CoGeneration system that could work at your site. Each 300 kW model (modular, so you can "gang" them) operates at 70% thermal efficiency but the system operates at over 97% total efficiency (thermal and electricity). Compared to a normal steam boiler system, it is even higher thermal efficiency, so the electricity is essentially free. When it operates, it makes HTHW (over 420F) AND up to 220F low/medium temp water. Each module also makes over 330,000 gallons of near-potable water a year at about 80-85F.

It cuts total CO2 releases (thermal and electric) by over 80% (about 2,000 tons a year per module) and cuts smog-producing NOx by 95%. It runs on any gaseous fuel (including landfill gas or digester methane) and can also run on any liquid fuel (including ethanol, bio-diesel or bio-kerosene).

For your site, you would likely need 4 units (maybe 5) so your CO2 savings would be between 7500 and 9400 metric tonnes. The payback is about 2 years.

Hope this help a bit.

What , may I ask, is the cogeneration (CHP) system you speak of with 97% efficiency?

It is a product called Max-E-Co built by Lighthouse Utility Solutions, Inc.

They are just getting into production, but I have seen the prototype at a J&J site in Georgia. During the summer, they had 105F combustion air becoming 84F exhaust.

It uses a microturbine built by someone else that has a super-low NOx release and, since the thermal process has already reduced CO2 and NOx, the electrical generation is pollution free so the 1.358 pounds of CO2 per kWh (US average releases) does not happen nor does the NOx that occurs in power generation.

Agreed.

97% sounds outlandish.

I have seen 58% efficiency with gas turbines coupled with heat steam recovery.

If this figure is correct, GE, Siemens, ABB, and everyone else is out of business.

How about a little more outlandish-ness? From the Lighthouse Utility Solutions website...

"A totally NEW approach to CoGeneration that operates at 99% annual efficiency (over 100% in summer) and lowers power and thermal CO2 releases by over 80% and NOx by over 95%. The electricity is often FREE and paybacks can be less than 2 years."

I'm not saying it isn't a good product/system... just some poor analysis.

Observed at the prototype installation-

105F entering air, 84F exhaust air- all the fuel AND 21F of 4150 SCFM air and gas volume while making 270 kW of power (with a 91% power factor) and 2,810,000 BTU input.

(4150 x (105 - 84) x 1.08 + 2,810,000 + (270 / 0.91) x 3412) / 2,810,000 =

(93,104 + 2,810,000 + 1,012,352) / 2,810.000 = (3,915,456) / 2,810,000 = 139.3%

Is that poor analysis? Or good engineering? Or should we change the website to more accurately reflect what the system actually can do?

Is that poor analysis?

YES! Any process that makes claims of performance greater than 100% efficiency is in direct violation of the laws of thermodynamics and therefore has errors.

Or good engineering?

Good engineering analysis would 1) not be incomplete, and, 2) have units.

I'll point out one simple error I see immediately... kw is a unit of power and BTU is a unit of energy.

BTW - efficiency in words is "what you get out divided by what you put in". In the above analysis you've added the "ins" to the "outs" (which makes no sense).

Or should we change the website to more accurately reflect what the system actually can do?

That'd be fantastic!! I checked the website and it is completely void of any technical information. I'd love to learn more about it. Like I said, I'm sure it's probably a great product, but having statements like "greater than 100% efficiency" will IMO drive away any potential customers.

On a side note, I've done performance analysis for over 12 years. I'd be happy to compile your data and put together a real technical performance paper for you. My going rate is $125/hr.

Since you need details-

AIRFLOW: 4150 Standard Cubic Feet of Air per Minute x 60 minutes = 249,000 SCF / hour

249,000 SCF x (0.24 BTU per pound specific heat of air) x (0.075 pounds of air per cubic foot) x (105 F entering air temperature - 84 F leaving air temperature) = 94,122 BTUH (BTUs per HOUR) provided by the system

ELECTRIC ENERGY: 270 kW at a 0.91 power factor is 296.7 kVA of energy. Every hour that it is generated, it has a value of 296.7 x 3412 BTU per kVA = 1,012,340 BTUH provided by the system

THERMAL ENERGY: 2,810,000 BTU PER HOUR input to the generator to produce the 296.7 kVA that became the 270 kW. So- 1,012,340 / 2,810,000 = 36% generating efficiency so 64% of the fuel leave the generator as heat. Since the leaving temperature of the exhaust stream is LESS than its entering temperature, it seems REASONABLE to determine that all of the heat added to the entering air has been extracted. Therefore, 1,797,660 BTU per hour have gone into various water streams that have gone through the coils of this system that are exposed to the exhaust air, which leaves an output of 1,797,660 BTU per hour provided by the system.

SO- The SYSTEM has provided an output of (94,122 + 1,012,340 + 1,797,660)

YES- MY LAST POST WAS NOT CORRECT- I GOT SLOPPY AND FORGOT TO BREAK OUT THE RESIDUAL HEAT FROM THE POWER GENERATED- I knew that ALL of the input thermal came out for beneficial use and went too fast.

Any way- 2,904,122 is captured by the system and sent to "users". 2,810,000 was supplied to the system. So the TRUE net efficiency based on output OF THE SYSTEM divided by input was 103.35%

By the way- I have been doing this kind of stuff for 42 years. I am a Certified Energy Manager (who answered ALL of the questions on the test) and am the recipient of an ASHRAE International First Place Energy Award. Every product shown in the Lighthouse website are my creations. Two- including this CoGen system, have been successfully prototyped and we expect to successfully prototype at least 4 more this year. Every product that we produce, or will produce cuts energy usage and environmental impact by at least 40% and will have a payback of less than two years. Our Solutions group, using a technique that I developed, consistently finds energy cost savings of 50% to 70% annually and environmental reductions even greater with paybacks of less than two years.

MY billing rate is $250 an hour if/when I charge except it is usually part of the fixed price rate (2% of the customer's annual utility bill) charged for the consulting services of Solutions.

By the way- although you seem to be focused on just how "good" this CoGen system is, what kind of feed back do you have for my original suggestion to the OP on how to very inexpensively reduce his operating costs and his CO2 output and cut water usage dramatically? Was that a bunch of BS as well? It has worked for others, I GAVE that away to him and anyone else who want to use it.

Look, plain and simple you CANNOT violate the laws of thermodynamics (period). That being said you CANNOT achieve >100% efficiency, either the calcs are wrong or the input data (period). Talk about what is "reasonable" as much as you want, spout out what awards you've won all day, and whatever certifications you might have DO NOT give you the ability to violate the laws (period). (And again while you've improved your analysis by adding units it is STILL lacking ... there is still NO mass and heat balance, without which it is pretty much garbage).

That being said, yes I am focused on the positive. Again, I don't doubt your product has actual and realized potential. Combine efficient microturbines with heat capture and you get an efficient system. It is quite often a step in the right direction for numerous facilities and is worth the OP spending some time looking at the option.

I'm willing to bet any engineer (PE) looking to install one of these will dump your literature the second they see >100% efficiency... it says nothing but "snake oil". I'm not saying this to be mean or rude, but stop for a second and seriously consider this. It's like a car salesman saying "this car doesn't consume gas, it makes it!" If you're serious about selling your product, hire a PE to do a real analysis on it, it will be money well spent.

(my apologies to -A- for having digressed into this)

Not at all!

This has me straining to remember a lecture in Thermo where a prof talked about >100% being possible within given constraints. Was it without entropy? Dang it! . . .

Even so, I am enjoying the argument.

-A-

Just think about a heat pump yielding more thermal output than the thermal equivalent of its electrical input.

If you can extract heat from the air with a heat pump, you can do it with a properly designed CoGen system.

Can you claim a reduction in CO2 emmissions because these exchanges between ChaoticIntellect and energygod have been typed and not spoken?

There is NOT a lot of analysis required to look at the numbers generated at the site of the prototype.

It IS doing what I have reported- It actually worked BETTER than we projected.

Those are the facts- nothing will change them.

There is NOT a lot of analysis required to look at the numbers generated at the site of the prototype.

Why not simply provide a full mass and energy balance?? You can't say any system is analyzed until this is done.

Had you actually done what you claim, you'd have received a Nobel prize instead of some first place energy award. The fact is you can't achieve greater than 100% efficiency... ever. That's the fact.

I'm trying to be polite here, letting you know that from a professional standpoint you're making yourself out to be a snake oil salesman which does nothing but hurt your credibility and the potential for your product.

You have me confused.

I have presented air flow, temperatures, thermal input, electrical output, and thermal output. What else is there to discuss or present?

I did not present the iterative air temperatures as it moved through the system, but I did present both the entering and the leaving temperatures. Obviously, something had to be heated by the air stream as it gave up its energy.

Going back to an earlier post- for my understanding of your thought process- what is the efficiency of a heat pump (air or water based) since the amount of heat delivered is greater than the equivalent energy used by the compressor?

In heat pumps the word efficiency is not used for the heating mode, because it has a very specific thermodynamic definition, but rather COP, or coefficient of performance, terminology used to express the ratio of useful heat movement to work input...There seems to be some confusion here in the terminology being used for heat movement to work input that is usually described in other terms...

I totally understand your point. It seems that, in order to not "confuse" someone with an non-technical background with the concept of MORE OUT THAN WAS PUT IN, it is easier to develop some form of descriptor that defines a relationship without using the same units on both sides.

Therefore we get COP, EER, etc. to use to compare products rather than RAW efficiency.

For many years, one of the comparisons used for CoGeneration systems was COST PER KWH because the systems were not thermally effective enough to be able to replace a primary thermal system.

No one considered the possibility of such a system actually having a NET thermal performance (BTUs delivered for use vs. BTUs input) that could exceed the performance of a system using a high-efficiency boiler, just like almost no one looks at the TRUE performance of their thermal systems using a "delivered vs. input" basis. I was once at a site where the boilers were tuned twice annually and running at nearly 83% thermal efficiency while every effort was made to operate the system as efficiently as possible, but- when I analyzed the "BTUs of steam delivered vs. the BTU input", that system was operating at 54% efficiency- which determines how much CO2 and NOx is created and how much it costs to operate the system.

Because we capture virtually ALL of the heat left after making electricity, and often some of the heat from the inlet combustion air, to make hot water for use by the thermal users, our system is generally over 70% "delivered" efficient- so it cost less to use than a standard heating system. It also has a lower CO2 and NOx release per delivered BTU than the standard heating system. The NOx is even lower yet because the generator has been designed and is certified to be an ultra-low NOx output device.

Because of that issue, all of the electricity that has been made is FREE- of cost and pollution. So- how can someone compare this system to a "normal" CoGeneration unit?

I know the "Chaotic" (and probably others) see this system as some form of SMOKE AND MIRRORS or some type of SNAKE OIL, but the really smart people who operate the facility where the prototype was installed, who work for a really big company that prides itself on its technical excellence, were satisfied enough with its performance that they gave it high marks when interviewed before we were awarded an award for Innovations in Engineering by the Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce- another no-nonsense organization.

Back to your original comment- Maybe we need to develop a "new" process performance terminology so everyone can compare products of this type- no matter who manufactures them.

A long time ago- I came across a quote- I forget the author now- but it went something like- THERE IS NOTHING MORE CHALLENGING, OR PRONE TO CREATE FRUSTRATION, THAN TAKING THE LEAD IN CHANGING THE WAY PEOPLE OR THINGS OPERATE. That kind of explains where we are now.

The generator is a microturbine that operates at about 30% HHV fuel-to-power efficiency. The hot exhaust gasses make high temp hot water (around 420F) and then heat "regular" water as high as 220F.

The exhaust gasses are cooled to a few degrees above entering water at the second coils (often domestic water) so well below the condensing temperature (which is 185F for turbines rather than the "usual" 132F for natural gas) so the 9.1% latent heat is captured as well.

96% (higher with hot inlet air) thermal recovery x 70% of input plus 30% (electric portion) of input = 0.971 + 0.3 or 97.1% efficiency.

This is an excellent suggestion. We had looked into co-gen a few years ago and the technology just wouldn't profitably scale down to our size.

I will put this one in the hat for further consideration.

-A-

You could capture the CO2 mechanically in a radial counterflow scrubber. See US Pat 7,901,485

Methane offsets from NG capture at manure ponds are available in California, so maybe Texas will offer some indirect way to contribute.

Have you considered converting to a plasma torch to burn the NG? I could not find a specific web site with this discussion, but they use them to burn coal cleanly. I suspect the torch would convert the CO2 into solid carbon of some sort.

Thank you, I will look into this . . .

-A-

I believe a copper steel wool in the exhaust ducts can act like a catalytic converter and convert some of the hot gasses into different more friendly pollutants.. I need more time to come up with the exact numbers and percent of conversions. MB

BY GEORGE I HAVE IT.......

STOP BREATHING, RUDDY SCUPPER HA!!!!!!!

http://www.vhemt.org/

WHHOOOO

That site is kind of Scary Morbid. It will keep me looking over my sholder for the followers of the site for a bit now.

as i've said before. it's a population problem., not renewable energy per say.

You have the acreage why not plant trees for Carbon Credits. I recommend the MEGAFLORA TREE it is very fast growing and has very valuable wood and it can be used as a biofuel. This species of trees can mature in as little as three to five years.... I.e. you can burn the trees to offset some of your gas cost.. Metric Buddha