>>11636144>>11633455>>11633662>>11633566>>11635569>>11635641No I didn't know that, pretty cool though.
Looks like the compost reaches 150-200 C before it combusts in certain scenarios. With a 200 C heat source you can do 35% efficiency at *best*, a bit less factoring in losses.
It's still not comparable to the 60% efficiency that higher temperature plants have, but it's something and it's sustainable if lots of space is available. It could power a farm and surrounding utilities, for example.
You could run water pipes through a field of compost, boiling the water in the pipe, then loop that water through a steam cycle.
It'd be a low efficiency steam cycle, but it's something.
Initial calculations/thoughts:
>Assuming you can maintain the compost bin at 200 C, you'd need a football field of compost to superheat a flow rate of 1 m^3/s of water, at 10 bar.>Assuming a heat generation rate of 0.1 MW/m^3 (low end for typical biothermogenic reaction) inside the compost field, this allows the field to stay at a constant temperature of ~200 C.>Need to add some extra organic chemicals to the field to raise the combustion temperature to 300 C, for safe measure.>Furthermore, gotta insulate the top of the field. Fresh new compost can serve as insulation, or can spread a tarp.I have engineering background to craft a white paper, and the connections to submit for funding. I'm gonna go for it, if anyone wants to join for the ride, post your qualifications.
