Household Waste into Clean Fuel: 2 Promising Options

As more and more governments and businesses are racing to find efficient and reliable solutions for providing energy, the one option that is both widely achievable on a house-by-house basis, as well as tackling two major environmental issues is turning household waste into clean fuel.

We know there are already many organisations that are doing this on a large scale, collecting household waste from large areas and turning it into energy in waste-to-energy plants. However, arguably a better way to benefit from this is to produce energy from domestic waste.

In this article we explore some of the reasons why this is a good idea and how we can transform household waste into clean fuel.

Reduce Waste Transportation and Limit Landfill Use

Let’s take for example the UK, where they throw away 7 million tonnes of food and drink waste as a population every year. Every bit of this waste is collected by local council services and transported some distance, eventually disposed of at landfill sites across the country.

The impact on the environment is two-fold in this case. Firstly, the heavy vehicles required to collect the domestic waste are less than environmentally-friendly. On the surface this may seem like a minor point, however when you consider how heavy these vehicles are, how slowly they move and how long they spend idling, they contribute a large amount to traffic pollution.

In fact, recent figures show that the average efficiency of these vehicles is around 4.4 mpg. Transportation of household waste obviously remains an issue even where commercial waste-to-energy plants are concerned, but can be remedied by turning solid waste to clean fuel.

The second and arguably more obvious impact of the traditional waste disposal process is that it requires a vast amount of land. Quite simply, by using household waste to generate renewable energy we are able to limit the amount of rubbish currently going to landfill sites.

1. Biogas

Up until now, it has been technically difficult to create renewable gas from household waste, such as food waste. Technological advancements have made it easier than ever to produce clean energy from household waste. This has been made possible by the anaerobic digestion process that can be used to biochemically decompose food waste into energy-rich biogas. This biogas can then be used in for cooking, heating, lighting and even power generation.

For those with the ambition and technical experience, it is possible to build your own biogas generator at home. Practically this is easier in a tropical climate where the environment makes perfect conditions for the production of biogas from a wide variety of organic wastes.

2. Biodiesel

There is a growing trend for car manufacturers to develop alternatives for traditional fuels, ranging from solar power to electric cars. One alternative is fuelling your car on biodiesel from used cooking oil. Practically, most diesel cars can be run off biodiesel with some minor alterations. This can be done by a specialist, but equally can be also achieved at home by those mechanically-inclined with specialist kits.

Arguably this may not be the most environmentally friendly option for fuelling cars as burning the oil for energy is comparable to diesel in terms of emissions. However, biodiesel are carbon-neutral due to absorbed carbon during the plants growing process. Also, when we consider the global issues with waste management, running our cars on biodiesel is a smart solution.

Bottom Line

Using household waste to produce clean fuel may not be as negative for the environment as media often paints it out to be. By limiting landfill usage and the curtailing harmful emissions during the waste disposal process, we are able to create environmental benefits.