Pittsburgh (PA) - Penn State University researcher Bruce Logan and his team have developed a unique method of harnessing hydrogen gas.  By creating a type of controlled microbial soup out of materials straight from a salad bar, a bacteria-induced chemical reaction takes place, ultimately resulting in large quantities of hydrogen gas.  But just how much hydrogen is produced?  The numbers dwarf other methods of producing hydrogen making this a very promising solution.

Researchers have designed a microbial electrolysis cell in which bacteria break up acetic acid (a product of plant waste fermentation) to produce hydrogen gas with a very small electrical input from an outside source. Hydrogen can then be used for fuel cells or as a fuel additive in vehicles that now run on natural gas. Credit: Zina Deretsky, National Science Foundation.

The team began working with various mixtures for the soup.  Over time they discovered that by changing the temperature, altering the ratio of water to the source materials, even adding a small amount of electricity, they were able to achieve efficiencies in excess of 90%.  Using straight vinegar, for example, a 91% efficiency was achieved.  Other materials provide 68% efficiency for raw, un-pretreated cellulose, 82% for lactic acid and acetic acid--both byproducts from normal fermentation.  Glucose lags furthest behind, being only 64% efficient.

How does it work?  Tiny bacteria sit in the soup along with a granulated graphite anode, a carbon with platinum cathode, and an off-the-shelf anion exchange membrane.  The bacteria consume the soup material, such as acetic acid.  In the process they release electrons and protons, even generating up to 0.3 volts.  When an additional 0.2 volts are applied from an external source, hydrogen gas bubbles begin to form.  These eventually collect and bubble up to the surface where they're pumped off and captured in a storage vessle.


Powerful return from input energy
The process produces 288% more energy than the electricity required to extract it.  Compared to water hydrolysis, for example, which is only 50% to 70% efficient making it require more input energy than the extracted hydrogen yields, this process is far more desirable.  It can be shown that even using enough of the harnessed energy to sustain the reaction, 144% more energy is produced.  This makes the microbial soup solution a real application for energy generation.


Clean energy
Best of all, it's clean energy.  When hydrogen is burned, the waste exhaust is comprised only of water vapor and heat.  No greenhouse gases are produced at all.  And any vehicle which can run on natural gas today can be converted to run on hydrogen.  The issues of high pressure hydrogen storage, and the large amount of overnight loss, still remain however.


Farm benefits
The researchers indicate another possible use for these kinds of microbial cells is for manufacturing fertilizer.  Instead of using current methods, which involve trucking in fertilizer made in factories, very large farms could begin using microbial cells.  They would take wood chips processed through a common practice used today, along with nitrogen from the air, to produce ammonia or nitric acid.  These can both be used as sources of fertilizer, or as feed material to make ammonium nitrate, sulfate or phosphate.

The research team has filed a patent for their discovery.  Their work was funded by the National Science Foundation, as well as Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.

Am I missing something here?

Nov 14, 2007 16:11     

Look if the process is generating CO2 on one end as shown in the diagram, then it is creating greenhouse gasses despite the author’s comments to the contrary. On the plus side, and what was not discussed, is that this may be a viable means of extracting a large amount of hydrogen from a renewable source.
Michael report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Clean Energy..

Nov 14, 2007 16:12     

"Best of all, it's clean energy. When hydrogen is burned the waste exhaust is comprised only of water vapour and heat." This is a common misconception and is only true in an environment where hydrogen is burned strictly in the presence of only oxygen, once you start burning in air there will be more by-products than simply water and heat. I mean, theoretically burning octane you 'should' only get water, heat and carbon dioxide, but we all know how well that works.

B report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

but...

Nov 14, 2007 16:27     

but what about the CO2 that is released in step 2 in the picture "Bacteria consume acetic acid releasing electrons, protons, C02". Is this somehow going to be scrubbed and made inert? Otherwise it'll be off gassed into the atmosphere as... a greenhouse gas. Right? I think it's great that it can maintain itself and create hydrogen in excess of what it needs (aside from plant fuel) to keep it going... but the waste products (CO2) need to be accounted for. This article needs to address the relative amount of CO2 created compared to the amount of Hydrogen.

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I must of superior vision

Nov 14, 2007 16:45     

...because in the decay of organic material you produce CO2 (clearly shown in the diagram). As far as I know (clearly not as much as Al Gore) carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. Making the statement later in the article null and void (i.e. "No greenhouse gases are produced at all."). I do like the efficiency claims though, but remember 'there is no free lunch' - Dr Hwang, University of Cincinnati, so you're paying for the seperation somehow. Kyle (BS ChE, University of Cincinnati, 2007)

Dr NO report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Wow

Nov 14, 2007 16:53     

Bacteria and algae are looking the be the greatest sources of energy. Wonder what oilman Bush is doing to put a stop to this?? After all, if in the future it became viable for regular folks to use this, the government could lose centralized control of energy. People could, gasp, make their own earth friendly energy instead of working 2 jobs to pay bills AND put gas in their car.
Dude report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

Greenhouse Gasses

Nov 14, 2007 17:00     

Keep in mind that water vapor actually is a greenhouse gas. Not only that, it is more prevalent and traps more heat energy than CO2. Hydrogen is a terrific fuel, but even it is not without potential drawbacks.
Jesse report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

No greenhouse gases at all?

Nov 14, 2007 17:01     

Is it me or is there a "CO2" molecule released? Wouldn't that mean that it's false to say "no greenhouse gases are produced at all"?
Dim report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Perpetual Energy

Nov 14, 2007 17:18     

Did I read this right? They discovered a way to create perpetual energy? "It can be shown that even using enough of the harnessed energy to sustain the reaction, 144% more energy is produced. "
mikefarinha report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

So

Nov 14, 2007 17:49     

How big a tank woul I need in my car to drive 300miles at 70mph on a sigle load of vinigar?
ikkeman report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

huh? where do they get off

Nov 14, 2007 18:14     

quote "Best of all, it's clean energy. When hydrogen is burned, the waste exhaust is comprised only of water vapor and heat. No greenhouse gases are produced at all." That is a HUGE BS statement - the diagram clearly shows CO2 being released! This is such a consistant theme with all of these arguments to suggest that Hydrogen can be a fuel source. The CO2 released will more than likely be 1:1 ratio with the amount of hydrogen that is produced. Also, considering that the best efficiency that was shown was 91% - that means that there will be more moles of CO2 produced than H2. I'm all for research on newer and trickier things, but, i find it insulting that these articles and discoveries keep coming up in which the conclusions do not accurately reflect what is really going on.

wesley mckenzie report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Remember...

Nov 14, 2007 18:19     

that any CO2 produced during the fermentation of the plant matter would just be the release of the very gases the plant absorbed while it was alive. The CO2 isn't so much produced as it is displaced.
Jack report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Don't believe the CO2 hype, do your own research

Nov 14, 2007 18:31     

It seems pretty ridiculous that at least 7 of the previous comments have stated that this would not be an environmentally positive project because of CO2 emissions. Please do your own research and find out that you shouldn't believe everything that is told to you. A nobel peace prize for that? Good grief. This process seems like a good step in the right direction.
chris report abuse vote down vote up Votes: -1

The CO2 would be produced anyway

Nov 14, 2007 18:31     

The CO2 would be produced by the decay of the plant material whether or not it was used in this process. And as the CO2 was mostly absorbed from the atmosphere by the plant during its lifetime, there would be more or less a zero overall increase. It's only burning *fossil* plants that adds to the the net amount in the atmosphere, as this CO2 would otherwise stay in the ground. Good point about water vapour being a greenhouse gas. But it tends to precipitate back into the oceans as rain, so perhaps it's not such a problem.

Julian report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

Not perpetual energy

Nov 14, 2007 18:46     

Even at first glance, you have to feed this thing with rabbit food to make it work. There's energy there, which is still conserved. Additionally there is the energy required to harvest all of the materials in the first place. This is an interesting method, but realistically gets us no closer to a hydrogen economy. The largest roadblock still stands in the way: a clean way to GET the hydrogen. Isn't that what this is? Partially, but your net energy will not be 144% or anything close to it once you factor in the harvesting issue.

Jack O'Neill report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

CO2 misunderstanding

Nov 14, 2007 18:52     

Two points. The CO2 released was captured when the plant was growing, so it does not increase the overall CO2 in the atmosphere (as opposed to oil, in which the CO2 has been trapped for millions of years and hence the worlds ecosystems have evolved without it). Also, it is not free energy either; it is effectively solar power because the plants stored the energy from the Sun as organic molecules (which are abundant in Hydrogen). The process described above takes the stored energy and converts it to something more useful.

Ben report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re: Perpetual Energy

Nov 14, 2007 18:57     

This is not perpetual energy it is the release of stored energy from the sun. Nearly all plants require sunlight and C02 to grow. A burning tree in the forest is not creating energy it is simply releasing the energy it has stored over its lifetime. The same thing is happening in the process described. Instead of an uncontrolled release of energy (fire) and byproducts (CO2) they have been able to make it produce Hydrogen which can be bottled and used at a later time. That being said this is really no different (in terms of waste products) then the steam engines of the 1800’s. Both take in plants/logs and break them down into energy. The differences being with the new process it takes more steps and possibly we maybe able to capture the “BAD” stuff. On a different note what is the proper CO2 level? What do you do if you take out too much CO2 and plants start to die because of O2 poisoning? If you are really concerned with CO2 release the best thing is to simply sit in the corner and breathe very slowly to reduce the amount of CO2 you put into the atmosphere. Use a magnify glass to cook your food which would need to be animals since eating vegetables would reduce the amount of things removing CO2 from the atmosphere. Or in the extreme case hold your breath till you turn blue.

RichR report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

not claiming Perpetual energy

Nov 14, 2007 19:02     

Was that supposed to be a joke? This isn't claiming perpetual energy anymore than using gasoline is perpetual energy... you still need to constantly input fuel. In this case, the fuel is the soup. The 288%/144% is based on the electricity needed to stimulate the reaction. The apparent surplus is actually the energy already stored in the chemical bonds of the plant material. In short, instead of getting methane from decomposition, you're getting hydrogen.

Jim L report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re: Clean Energy.. Nov 14, 2007 16:12

Nov 14, 2007 19:07     

"I mean, theoretically burning octane you 'should' only get water, heat and carbon dioxide, but we all know how well that works." That's not even remotely true. Octane is C8H18. Combustion, as a process, breaks the chemical bonds in the molecule, and bonds them with oxygen molecules in the air. So if you burn one molecule of pure octane, you should end up with 8 molecules of CO2, and 9 molecules of H2O. Not exactly what I would call "only water". Hydrogen, however, is simply H2. The only thing it can *ever* make via a combustion reaction is H2O, regardless of whether the reaction is happening under "ideal" conditions or not. Regardless, the real problem with the new approach of creating hydrogen is that the creation process itself releases CO2. However, the article doesn't say in what quantity, or whether or not there's a way to manage it. That aside though, it's like they finally invented the first half of Mr. Fusion. Now we just need the other half...the part that uses the hydrogen produced inside of a self-contained, localized fusion reaction to produce usable energy.

some1ne report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Lack of physhics understand

Nov 14, 2007 19:14     

Considering we all computer geeks the lack of physics/chemical understanding is astounding. Now personally don't agree with all this Human caused global warming. But first , this is not perpetual motion, the 288% is only for electricity to convert the acid to hydrogen, not counting the sun/solar energy to grow the plant, and their is the energy required to setup fermentation process. Now the co2 , is a green house gas. But that emission wouldn't be a big deal. A. The emission of co2 most likely won't be much more than the plants natural decay release of CO2 B. the co2 would be reabsorbed by plants grown for future hydrogen, thus its in a cycle unlike co2 released from fossil fuels which was sequestered underground and changes the balance of the atmosphere. c. the hydrogen production system as envisioned here will have central production of co2 instead of every car producing co2 thus allowing scrubbing, or capturing and sequestering the co2 emitted. Technically the writer is right or wrong depending on your definition of "produce" burning fossil fuels produces more co2 than naturally, while this process may be no net gain. Now this technology is very intriguing as far as making portable energy/battery with fuel cells, and replacing gasoline in that capacity. Have a feeling as far as power production nuclear/coal/oil/hydro and maybe solar plants would be more efficient. My major question is what is the efficiency of biomass to hydrogen. How much land needed to be devoted to plants to get sufficient amount of hydrogen (why solar/wind not a good idea). This is a no go if you need a acre of land to produce hydrogen for 1 car. Other question would be how much would this increase in food production cost, which is primary reason ethanol fuel is a NO GO.

Dave report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

Yay, Context!

Nov 14, 2007 19:22     

I'm glad so many smart people were able to figure out what was being talked about in the "Clean energy" subheading. Obviously its not just talking about burning hydrogen .. no, wait, yes it is. Congratulations everyone who read that and said "but the diagram..!" He's pretty obviously not talking about the diagram, he's talking about burning the hydrogen, which should be plainly obvious from reading it. It being more than just the heading itself. ..Obviously. As for perpetual energy guy, yes, this is perpetual energy in the same way that burning coal is perpetual energy. There's an input material and some energy is used to extract more energy (in some form) from it. Basically, the implication there would be that there's a good deal more energy stored than it takes to get it out. It would seem to me that the advantage of clean in this case is that CO2 is only produced in the process of extracting/making the fuel, as opposed to gas where its dirty on both ends. Please, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't have a degree in any of this, after all :)

Sean report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

nothing is created, nothing disapears

Nov 14, 2007 19:31     

The number of C, O and H atoms is constant. with hydrolysis: 2.H20 electricity -> 2.H2 O2 with this reaction: CH3COOH O2 electricity -> 2.C02 2.H2 if you consider that the vinegar is made of ethanol: C2H5OH O2 -> CH3COOH H2O and the ethanol itself from hexose: (from Plant) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fermentation) C6H12O6 -> 2.C2H5OH 2.CO2 if we sum up: C6H12O6 4.O2 electricity -> 2.H2O 6.C02 4.H2 that's a lot of C02 but the C atoms must finish somewhere... anyway, plants are supposed to use that CO2. The whole question is: we are using plants like a geant solar panel: they use the solar power to grow and transform C02 H20 in "plant" that we use to produce H2 CO2 H20. Is that process more effective than directly producing H2 from solar panels & hydrolysis ? It's not even sure that this is cheaper (the plants are not recolted without energy and money...)

mc report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Carbon Neutral

Nov 14, 2007 19:31     

I think what they are trying to say is the process is carbon neutral. Just a chemical engineer talking here but this process doesn't produce any CO2 since growing more plant material would probably pull out whatever CO2 was produced. As compared with CO2 from oil out of the ground where there is no cycle. This is the advantage that ethanol has too but hydrogen would be way more efficient for combustion.

ben report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Some answers

Nov 14, 2007 19:32     

- The CO2 released comes from the fuel for the reaction, which has been bound from the atmosphere when the fuel grows. The reaction is exacty as CO2-neutral as any bio fuel. - 144% only counts the electricity and not the energy bound in the biological fuel. - Water wapor is a greenhouse gas but realeasing more of it into the atmosphere do not increase the total ammount significantly as more of it will condense as well.

Jonas report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Greenhouse gases and effeciency

Nov 14, 2007 19:48     

Firstly, do we all need to hit the panic button and comment on the CO2 output without reading previous posts about the same subject? Second, this process releases 288% more energy (in the form of Hydrogen) than the amount of energy (in the form of electricity) required to extract it. It is still only 90% efficient, and does lose some energy to heat, electrical resistance, feeding the bacteria clean water & plant waste, etc. Far from perpetual motion.

rebturtle report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

No net CO2 increase

Nov 14, 2007 19:49     

Remember, the CO2 that is released comes from the plant material that is used to fuel the reaction. These plants consume CO2 from the atmosphere to grow, therefore there is no net increase in atmospheric CO2 levels.
knobby report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

@ mikefarinha

Nov 14, 2007 20:09     

that is true only of electricity but the energy comes from a biological source...
jackass report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

RE: Perpetual Energy

Nov 14, 2007 20:12     

@Dim: "It can be shown that even using enough of the harnessed energy to sustain the reaction, 144% more energy is produced. " The reaction still needs fuel...so, no, this is not perpetual energy. It just doesn't need an independent source of electricity.
jag report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Support global warming

Nov 14, 2007 20:19     

Whose in favor of global cooling? I hear there was farming in icland not so many centuries ago. I bet those Icelandic farmers wouldn't mind some global warming.
charlie report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Bog, Bottle, Funnel

Nov 14, 2007 21:36     

Take a 2 liter bottle, fill it up with water in a bog, put a funnel in the end of it, and turn it upside down in the water. Stomp around, stomp around. Gas bubbles will come out of the decaying leaves and float up through the funnel and into the bottle, displacing the water. Go to a landfill and see the burning flame. How is "discovery" new? Don't bacteria break down vegetation in natural already, producing natural gas? I guess I must be missing something...but if we grow corn just to rot it, why don't we just harness the gases from...oh I don't know...our decaying feces?

JohnDoe report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Looks very promising

Nov 14, 2007 22:34     

My understanding of Corn Ethanol Plants is that they produce piles and piles of Cellulose as a waste by-product. If you can convert this Cellulose to useable energy in the form of Hydrogen at 68% efficiency... Maybe you could use this to power your Ethanol plant to begin with. Then you can produce corn Ethanol at half the cost.
Rich report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Water Vapor

Nov 14, 2007 22:47     

I'm an environmental engineer and no matter what product an exhaust produces, it affects the environment. Everyone is paranoid about CO2 as a greenhouse gas, and there are definite reasons to be concerned, but global warming is just one of them. Do some research on the other greenhouse gases and you'll see that water vapor (the same thing that comes our our environmental cars) is a huge greenhouse gas as well. While I'd rather trade CO2 for water vapor, it still won't solve global warming. It will allow our oceans to become less acidic however, and coral reefs and fish to again increase.

Mike M report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Nothing is perfect...

Nov 14, 2007 22:52     

Sooner or later we WILL run out of gasoline to power our cars. Least they are on the right track in producing hydrogen in large amounts to make it economically feasible. The only trade off is CO2 being produced in the process. If this stuff is being done at a manufacturing plant they will capture the CO2s via scrubbers so not really much of an issue. Maybe they'll take the CO2 gas and pipe it to a local greenhouse for the plants to convert it to oxygen via photosynthesis?

Darkk report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

are you serious with that

Nov 14, 2007 23:15     

hey people read the article in context when it says that no green house gasses are produced it is refering to the burning of the hydrogen in an engine not the refining process and the co2 is being produced by the bacteria just like any other organism as it consumes oxygen.
dude report abuse vote down vote up Votes: -1

Bacteria and algae are much less fanatic

Nov 14, 2007 23:29     

Make the world a much safer place.
nofubu report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re:Re: Clean Energy..

Nov 14, 2007 23:51     

""I mean, theoretically burning octane you 'should' only get water, heat and carbon dioxide, but we all know how well that works." That's not even remotely true. Octane is C8H18. Combustion, as a process, breaks the chemical bonds in the molecule, and bonds them with oxygen molecules in the air. So if you burn one molecule of pure octane, you should end up with 8 molecules of CO2, and 9 molecules of H2O. Not exactly what I would call "only water". Hydrogen, however, is simply H2. The only thing it can *ever* make via a combustion reaction is H2O, regardless of whether the reaction is happening under "ideal" conditions or not. " Sorry, are you daft? I didn't say it would create only water, I said only water, heat and CO2. HOWEVER, when burning in the atmosphere we also get NO, NO2, and CO to name a few other emmisions, a lot of these same by-products could form if you're burning hydrogen in the presence of just air and not feeding it a supply of pure O2.

B report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re: nothing is created, nothing disapears..

Nov 14, 2007 23:55     

"if you consider that the vinegar is made of ethanol: C2H5OH O2 -> CH3COOH H2O" I must have missed that class in university, for some crazy reason I thought vinegar was 2-10% acetic acid.. Oh wait, it is.
B report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Pfft, I like burning galons of fuel !

Nov 15, 2007 00:12     

I get my fuel for free, and I'm trying to burn as much as I can (in my engine - 5L V8) before the greenpeace people are going to ban it.. So burn it while you got it!
EvilCar report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

combustion

Nov 15, 2007 01:07     

Burning hydrogen with air will create NOx as well. I could be wrong but I dont think water has enoough oxygen in it to complete combustion (and you can run hydrogen at rediculous air/fuel ratios, some create less NOx than others)
mike report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Read carefully! The CO2/Greenhouse part is right

Nov 15, 2007 01:23     

Many of you are claiming that the author is wrong in saying that greenhouse gases are not produced. If you read the paragraph correctly, he says "When hydrogen is burned, the waste exhaust is comprised only of water vapor and heat. No greenhouse gases are produced at all." This statement is about the use of hydrogen gas as a fuel while the article itself is about the extraction of hydrogen gas. They are two totally separate processes. The Microbial Electrolysis cell produces C02 as a byproduct. Burning Hydrogen in a hydrogen fuel cell does not.

JDNG report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

C02

Nov 15, 2007 02:16     

when any plant decays it releases CO2... but when it was alive it was taking in that CO2. so plants are concidered carbon neutral. Where when you burn gas you are releasing "new" CO2 into the atmosphere
Josh report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

Plants again.

Nov 15, 2007 02:27     

Using plants as a fuel source will only lead to tears. The problem has ever been that there are people out there who are willing to mess up the world for profit. And if profit can be made from cutting up plants and feeding it into a machine that can produce fuel then there will be people out there who are willing to feed all plants into the machine if it means they can make extra profit. Look at the story of paper... Paper is not even really needed in a modern office, but still most of the paper in the US is made from trees cut down in the south-American rain forests. Just because greedy people see common people who are wasteful as a sign of a market. So paper is cheap. Is the world's rain forests cheap? So now we want to generate fuel from plants. I think between paper, the need for farmland for food and biofuel, firewood, droughts from global warming, bush fires from droughts and global warming and now H2 production the forests of the world do not stand a chance. Did I miss anything? Come on already... Get disillusioned with humanity. In general we're a bunch of morons. Realize that we cannot afford to take risks. If clever people do not make the right decisions then we're all screwed.

yada report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +1

Same is done with sewege water

Nov 15, 2007 02:46     

Same results have been accomplished some months ago with sewege water in The Netherlands with a similar procedure with bacteria. Plans are being made to produce hydrogen, profitly, on a large scale by 2010. Dirty business :)
Bob Kavanagh report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

CO2 production =/= emission

Nov 15, 2007 02:55     

Producing CO2 is not an environmental problem, the problem is emitting it. I mean, producing CO2 in a controlled power plant let us a lot of means to efficiently store/convert it instead of emitting it in the environment, while producing it in many small and inefficent engines will just throw all of it in the atmosphere. And H2 is by far the cleanest combustible we can use to burn in the atmosphere from small engines, so it's IMHO a good thing.

dog report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Efficiency & Carbon Neutrality

Nov 15, 2007 03:18     

The efficiency terms here are somewhat vague - how is the efficiency of this defined? Moles of H2 per Mole of... "soup"? This does seem like some kind of process, though, and much better than producing H2 from petroleum-based hydrocarbons. Also, the process is carbon neutral, as Ben pointed out. It does release CO2, but it comes from plant matter, which will degrade (probably via those same bacteria) naturally anyway, and must be replentished (using CO2 from the air) to replentish the "soup" fuel. Now to come up with a good way to store a highly explosive gas...

zipz0p report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

90% efficiency

Nov 15, 2007 04:15     

Good article, but I'm a bit confused. Lots of people noted the CO2 being generated in the process (although, as some said, it can be contained). But the article doesn't say how much energy it takes to make the battery and the "soup". If it takes huge amounts of plant matter, which must be harvested/collected and transported to a plant, shouldn't the energy spent there be factored in? Anyway, as far as fuels go, I think hydrogen may be a reasonable alternative to fossil fuels. But the BEST alternative is and will always be TO USE LESS OR NOT TO USE ANY FUEL AT ALL (energy efficient vehicles and buildings, mass transport, etc).

Daemonios report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Doc was right!...

Nov 15, 2007 05:01     

Yes, It appears Doc in "Back to the future" was right. You put garbage in your car fuel tank and it works...
yesgrey3 report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

still cleaner than petrol

Nov 15, 2007 06:05     

When you burn petrol you have all of the other chemicals besides CO2 that go up in the air. This method gives you the option of adding another stage to the CO2 output, like some kind of algae that can fix the CO2 issue. I would still like to know if you take a bus and run it with this method what the CO2 output per mile is compared to petrol plus all the sulfur and other garbage that is emitted from gaz.

Jason report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

comment regarding the neutrality of CO2...

Nov 15, 2007 07:32     

Several people above stated that because the plant initially stored the CO2 when it was growing that therefore there was no net increase in the CO2 in the atmosphere. The same could be said about the oil we get out of the ground now. The molecules making up the hydrocarbons we pump out of the ground came from living organisms. think about it - if we produce X tons per year of carbon due to combustion. Then we will have to produce (X efficiency loss tons) equivalent to replace oil as a primary energy source. You can argue that this is a neutral cycle, but, it is not entirely - you still have to grow, harvest, transport and process whatever feed stock you are inputting into this process. The process itself is highly efficient, but, the steps prior to it are not necessarily efficient. Through this process you are still contributing a considerable amount of net CO2 into the atmosphere. The question that STILL remains and none of these quacks have ever stated is "how much is too much". Would someone PLEASE identify how many millions of tons of net CO2 emissions into the atmosphere can be tolerated by the environment without resulting in global warming? Otherwise all of these novel cool smarty pants ideas / processes are pointless. What is trully needed is a way to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere faster than they are produced. Otherwise everything becomes moot because eventually there will be enough people on earth that simple respiration alone will result in CO2 emissions that are "too much" for the environment to handle. At that point, it won't matter if we are all driving perpetual motion machines. Right now humans produce one-third of all of the excess CO2 that goes into the atmosphere - if we are putting too much CO2 into the atmosphere now, what happens in 50 years when there are 18 billion people on the planet?

wesley mckenzie report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Two questions

Nov 15, 2007 07:43     

1) When can I buy it? 2) How much will this cost me? Get my dollars out of OPEC - ASAP! If this is just news without a future then I don't need this. But if someone is going to develop this into an engine that can power a car, I'd like to know the hidden bits of information as well. Any speculation as to how much that membrane separating the anode and cathode will cost to replace? And how much hydrogen is stored in that soup? It seems promising, but distant.

9Nails report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re: Am I missing something here?

Nov 15, 2007 08:09     

I think the reason they consider it clean even though it gives off co2 is because when plants decay the naturally give off co2. So they probably consider it green house neutral (There's another name for it that I can remember). However IMO if you are growing crops you didn't use to for energy production your not green house neutral.
Action Jackson report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Re: Re: Am I missing something here?

Nov 15, 2007 08:23     

After thinking about my last comment "IMO growing more plants for energy would not be carbon neutral", this is most likely wrong because the new plants grown would use that CO2 and convert it to O2 thus making it still carbon neutral. Nothing like correcting yourself.
Action Jackson report abuse vote down vote up Votes: +0

Hydrogen hype

Nov 15, 2007 08:32     

Bio-diesel is better, move along. Hydrogen means only trouble with storage, transporting, pumping to your car, etc. Net result would be similar. Unless you use more efficient fuel cells to burn hydrogen. However, cost of building infrastructure for hydrogen economy is enormous. We should go biofuels or straight electric.
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CO2 misconception

Nov 15, 2007 09:06     

Congrats to all those who noticed the CO2 being released in the diagram. Keep in mind however that the source of this CO2 IS renewable... ie, the plant waste. Any CO2 that is released can be accounted for by the plants grown for this energy production... in case you don't recall but plants consume CO2 and use it as a building block for their structure. This groudbreaking process breaks the plants down releasing both CO2 and hydrogen... then other plants use the CO2 to grow... and then this process breaks them down... and on and on... Compare this to fossil fuel methods of creating energy where the sources of CO2 are mined from the ground and released into the atmosphere... never being reconstituted back to the source of the energy. Sounds very promising... when can I get one?

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CO2 is not bad CO is bad

Nov 15, 2007 09:09     

CO2 is very natural. It is green house gas yes but not a bad one. The bads are CO with destroy the Ozone (this is from burning gasoline). And methane ( mostly from animal stock - cows). Plants convert C02 to O2. C02 does increase the heat the plant holds but its not a bad gas. As much as I respect Gore Global warming is not a problem from C02 gas. If the polar ice caps melt the ocean surface area increase and C02 abosation increases and the caps refreeze. Its an endless cycle this workd goes through. Humans are just upset not because like idiot we build on area that 1 foot or less above see level. In non developing areas if they are on sea level they build up off the grounds.

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The important part of this isn't the efficiency or ...

Nov 15, 2007 09:19     

The important part of this isn't the efficiency or the carbon neutrality, the important part is that both are achieved using "plant waste". Instead of ethanol production using the edible parts of plants, this is using everything else. Hopefully a process can be achieved like this to have renewable fuel production without leading to (more) worldwide starvation.
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Water Vapor?

Nov 15, 2007 09:24     

Ok, to the people complaining about water vapor being a greenhouse gas, and this will produce more; is the air suddenly going to be able to HOLD more water vapor? Correct me if I'm wrong, but the atmosphere already gets more water vapor than it can actually hold, this is why we have rain. So, if we are adding MORE water vapor into the atmosphere, that just means it will rain more. You aren't changing the atmosphere's ability to hold water, so the amount in the atmosphere will not change.

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won't pollutants help

Nov 15, 2007 09:40     

if we ad some impurities to the water vapor, say DDT or Selenium, won't that guarantee the water vapor will fall to earth faster and not pollute right below the upper atmosphere?
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lets not forget about our old friend: Methane!

Nov 15, 2007 09:41     

we should all have cesspools to produce our own gases which we can burn! @yesgrey3: "Mr. Fusion Home Energy Reactor", I was going say that. I have to repeat the propaganda from our oil-overlords: "plants breath CO2 if we didn't make CO2 then the plant would suffocate! doesn't anyone care about the plants?"
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Can't see the paper for the trees...

Nov 15, 2007 09:48     

> most of the paper in the US is made from trees cut down in the south-American rain forests You're a clotheaded idiot. Most paper in the US comes from pine trees expressly grown for making paper out of them. No forested trees were harmed during the making of this statement. Ignorant Moron.
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re. 90% efficiency

Nov 15, 2007 10:05     

Whether taken to a H2 plant or elsewhere, the plant material must be harvested, or at least removed from the field, anyway. But you are correct in questioning the efficiency. Everyone seems to forget that the low pressure H2 produced must be compressed to several thousand PSI to be usable. I bet it is still a net energy loss once compressed to a usable pressure.
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Can't see the paper for the trees.... 2

Nov 15, 2007 10:11     

Much pine for paper also comes from canadian artic pine forests which are being mowed down for all our benefits like the colorful catalogues in our mail boxes that usually (for me) go right into the trash....
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What some are missing about how this:

Nov 15, 2007 10:21     

This is a good/perfect solution for plant waste. I.E. We harvest the corn, and eat the good stuff. The stalks before would probably be dumbed. re-ground into the earth. Well now you can take that stalk and make h2... Your costs are for the machine. The plant matter will be free. Its like getting paid for your grabage.
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Hydrogen vs. Gasoline: Safety and Efficiency

Nov 15, 2007 10:47     

Blanket statements about hydrogen being unsafe are uninformed, to say the least. Gasoline, and especially gasoline vapors, are *extremely* flammable. And yet, despite Hollywood's insistence to the contrary, cars do not blow up, even in catastrophic circumstances. Neither do methane fuel tanks, which are in many public transportation vehicles these days. Hydrogen *can* be made safe! And the complaints about compressing hydrogen, etc.: what about the fuel used to drill for, ship, refine, ship again, and pump gasoline? Gasoline has the equivalent draw-backs. Before we shoot down alternative energy sources as "inefficient" or "dangerous" or "not good for the US economy...", let's actually *try* these things. ...and get all our facts straight.

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what do you do with the left over slurry

Nov 15, 2007 10:48     

If this is truly efficient, then great. Do it at the power plant, and feed my electric car. My question is... What is, and what do you do with the left over slurry? Plants go in, CO2 and H2 come out. Plants are made of much more than CO2 and H2. Also besides bacteria, water? and plants does anything else have to go into or out of the soup for this to work? Does the cathode or anode decay...
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Riesz Fischer

Nov 15, 2007 11:51     

It's produced using plant waste, so there's no net gain in atmospheric CO2. Plants are made from CO2 in the first place.
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Re: Re: nothing is created, nothing disapears..

Nov 15, 2007 12:00     

first: all the " " (plus) signs have disappeared from the message (decreasing the quality of the text...) second: OK I said "of" ethanol istead of "from" ethanol...
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It's sin to use food to power up your car !

Nov 15, 2007 12:14     

A/ Making fuel out of wheat, corn ... is not really effective: you use 80% of the produced energy to create it... B/ The quantity of corn needed to fill your tank once is what a familly need for food for 1 YEAR ! In some countries, they have destroyed the forests to produce corn... to make ethanol ! (see the example of Brasil that destroy the amazonian forest to make ethanol from can sugar) West/North countries (USA, Canada, Europe) can deal with the increasing price of the food: it's only a small pourcentage of their incomes that is spend on that (except maybe for the 10% working poor americans but it's another story) But many countries need to import that food to eat because they cannot produce enough or because the local producers prefers to sell it at the high price (to make ethanol...) rather than selling it to local people at a lower price (so they can eat). C/ Organic wastes are "free": we already produce them... Of course, you need to have a specific waste can for them, they must be collected separatly, and you need to transform them into energy... D/ The problem is: do we produce enough organic wastes that can be used ?

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To those that don't read well

Nov 15, 2007 12:15     

I've just read 2 comments and coincidentally both were incorrectly interpreting what the author of the article said in terms of greenhouse gases. Let's see what the article says: "When hydrogen is burned, the waste exhaust is comprised only of water vapor and heat. No greenhouse gases are produced at all." Clearly, the premise is that BURNING hydrogen doesn't release greenhouse gases. This is correct. Now the overall process does release CO2. This CO2 is released inside the same tank as the hydrogen and can be pumped and stored in a similar way.

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Need more information - or any opinion is useless

Nov 15, 2007 13:29     

After reading the article and the posts it is clear that more information is required. To understand the net effect of this process the whole lifecycle of the system needs to be explored. 1. How much CO2 is released per H2 produced? 2. What is the amount of microbial soup must be put in per H2 released? 3. Where is the microbial soup coming from? 4. How much CO2 is absorbed by the plants going in to the soup versus the CO2 coming out of the process? 5. What is the required amount of land needed per gas equivalent in order to remove the need for fossil fuel requirements in the country? 6. What processes today produce plant waste that would be recycled in this process? 7. What are the other byproducts of this process and what are their uses? 8. What is the economy of scale for the mass market? 9. What is the investment cost of the system versus the return? 10. How is the soup made for maximum efficiency and what pollutants come from the process? 11. What is the net required energy and wastes associated with growing all the plants, especially with the growing issues around water resources. All in all, there is now way to pass judgment on this system without being truly informed. Having extensive knowledge about the entire end to end solution is required. I apologize to those who have stated opinions already, but before passing judgment, be truly educated. Therefore I cannot state my own opinion on this solution until provided total and clear evidence for its net effect.

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h20 burnning

Nov 15, 2007 14:05     

from what im reading the soup is from the plant fementation which can be from the parts of the plants we dont eat. unlike ethanal producton this dosent sound like it needs the high suger parts. a lot of the gathering of the plant castoffs could be retaineed at harvesting time for this fermentation. The residue from the fermentation may be able to be used as fertalizer to gro more plants (maybe I dont know what the by products from the fermentation would be) If the hydrogen production rate is fast enough you don't need compress it to use it. compressing the hydrogen is for storage, you dont burn hydrogen at high pressure (maybe rockets do hehe). So again with a large volume being produced it could be burned right there to produce electricity instead of being compressed and stored to burn later. I think that to produce sufficent volume of hydrogen to use right away would take a large amount of space. I would think this space requierment would be larger then what you would hava avalible in your car. but perhaps a power plant would have the avalable space requierment so this could replace coal/fosel power plants. personaly I don't think hydrogen is a viable replacment for fule in cars because of the storage problems of hydrogen. however it is interesting and hopefully its somthing that could be scaled up for commercial use.

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re: Hydrogen vs. Gasoline: Safety and Efficiency

Nov 15, 2007 15:22     

there are several things that inherntly make gasoline safer then hydrogen. One it is only vapor that burns not liquds. so a tank of gasoline will not explode as its not vaporised. Even if the tank is ruptured it dosen't have a chance of exploding. yes the car can catch fire and burn but this will not usualy result in an explosion and certanly not hollywood style in any case. Hydrogen will vaporise fairly quickly if the holding tank is ruptured and the vapor is higly volitile so it would have a greater chance of having combustion happen then gasoline. leaky fule lines are defintly more likely to have catastophic consequence with hydrogen then gasoline. maintence on the cars is something you have to take into consideration as well. its eiser to maintain gasoline delivery system (and yet some people don't) then hydrogen

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chemical composition of natural gas

Nov 15, 2007 15:46     

Methane (CH4) 70-90% Ethane (C2H6) 5-15% Propane (C3H8) and Butane (C4H10) < 5% CO2, N2, H2S, etc. balance% I wonder if it would be possible with all this new hydrogen out there if we could find some sort of organism that will make these gases for us without the balance of garbage CO2, N2, H2S, etc. A little bioengineering would be cool here.
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how's this idea?

Nov 15, 2007 16:57     

Build a power plant based on this process next to a brewery or winery or distillery. Take the fermentation byproducts and feed them to the power plant. Also next to the plant, build a factory that produces dry ice or CO2 fire extinguishers. Feed the CO2 produced by the power plant to that factory as raw material. I believe our future lies in taking advantage of such industrial synergies.
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Innaccurate.

Nov 15, 2007 20:05     

"produce more energy than it consumes" means greater than 100% efficient. You said 90% efficient. I'd ask which is it, but greater than 100% efficient is simply not possible. [The reaction takes place with the input power of 0.2 volts. The process requires bacteria and consumes the source material. That consumption is taking place at 90% efficient, meaning in the end the source material (acetic acid, for example), still has 10% of its hydrogen bound up inside. The input power required is only 0.2 volts, and the gas bubbles off. When it is consuming these things, and there is an input power of 0.2 volts, the amount of hydrogen extracted is more than the 0.2 volts input, thereby it produces more direct energy than it consumes. -Rick] Thus, this is inaccurate. Good news that they can do so well, but don't misrepresent.

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there is another consideration...

Nov 15, 2007 20:29     

The material that goes into this process is some biomass material that is already serving some purpose in the carbon cycle. And now it is to be diverted. Don't think that what remains in the field is useless. If this material isn't returned to the soil to decay and replenish soil nutrients(Nitrogen, etc.) then what will become of the soil and of its ability to grow a new crop. I don't think you would like the answer. For example, does anyone remember the dust bowl days in the central part of the US during the '30s?

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the missing biomass

Nov 15, 2007 20:37     

This system uses biomass to produce hydrogen. biomass is not a waste product. It is an important part of the carbon cycle. Do not think that after (for example) that after the corn harvest that the material remaining on the fields is useless. If that material is not present it cannot decay and go back into the soil in the form of nutrients and humus that serves to retain soil moisture and promote essential microbial growth. The result? Think 1930's style dust bowl conditions with land that is no longer productive. I don't see that anybody else here has considered that part of the carbon cycle.

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You useful idiots...

Nov 16, 2007 01:53     

To all of you Al Gore alarmists: Please take a break from the hype-driven high you're on for a moment, and open your mind to some REAL SCIENCE. Remember the lovely graph Al used in his so-called documentary that showed CO2 levels lining up with temperature change? Well, Al fooled you by 'inconveniently' compressing the timeline (X-axis) to meet his agenda. Stretch that timeline out, and include a plot of solar activity (sun spot observations) and you'll see what approx. 1/2 of the scientists in the IPCC were saying all along... GLOBAL WARMING IS NOT CAUSED BY MAN. ITS THE SUN, STUPID! You need look no further than the actual IPCC report for your data. Now, if you want to fight a battle against power of the Sun, by all means knock yourself out. But quit insisting that the rest of us follow you on your stupid crusade. That's right, it's a religion not a science. Read on. Al is using your soft little minds to help fan the flames of hysteria, so that he can use political pressure to do one simple thing: Create a global commodities exchange for the belching of CO2 into the atmosphere, essentially imposing a "tax" on anyone who wants to burn anything for industrial purposes. Soak corporations around the world for cash, all so that the little people who are screaming about the sky falling will feel better about buying their "greener-than-thou" products. Wake up! You are being used. Follow the money. It's one thing to be concerned about the environment, but it's another to be bent over and screwed by junk science and cries of, "the sky is falling." PS: If they ever awarded me the Nobel prize, I'd burn it and send Al Gore the carbonized left-overs! A once-great institution, now for sale to pop-culture. A Nobel prize? To they guy who tried to sensor rock and roll back in the 80's? Zero integrity.

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I can't believe the level of ignorance.

Nov 18, 2007 01:02     

I guess a lot of you guys here, if you had a nugget of gold in your hands, you would throw it away thinking something negative about it. Basically, when the author said "no greenhouse gasses are produced, he meant when you burn the product. Reading comprehension is required here folks! Now, i don't know the stoiometric efficiency of the bacteria when it converts acidic acid into H2. O2 acidic acid -> 2CO2 H2 this is efficient because co2 out put is controlled by a process that is already natural as opposed to buried Hydrocarbons.

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Misleading use of

Nov 18, 2007 13:13     

90% of what? 'Efficiency' is not a magical word, it has a mathematical definition which must be stated with the 90% to mean anything. [It was stated. 91% of the available hydrogen is extracted. When it's all over, the goo has 9% of the potentially extractable hydrogen left in it. -Rick] My incandescent light bulb is 100% efficient at generating heat. [It isn't. Some of the power you put in is emitted as light. Of course, it's almost negligible at around 3% or so. :) -Rick] So what? Setting that aside, we are told 144% of the energy (in the form of electricity, I presume) is converted to [hydrogen] potential energy. That is also left vague. All this means is some of the biomass potential energy and some of the electrical potential energy are converted to hydrogen POTENTIAL energy. Why not just burn the biomass? That is at least carbon neutral. Using electricity is (in reality) not. And what about the efficiency of converting that hydrogen energy to work? I bet it's less than just using the electricity. People who are interested in energy should familiarize themselves with fundamental laws of thermodynamics and quit with what amounts to a belief that a perpetual motion device is just around the corner. Thermodynamics is not a weak, tentative science folks, it's very, very fundamental. Oh, and this whole hydrogen economy thing is just the Bush administration's stalling tactic to avoid doing anything substantive about waste and carbon dioxide emissions. If we want a hydrogen economy, first we need clean ENERGY. Hydrogen is just a container to carry the energy in! Wake up!!!! [Calm down!!!! -Rick]

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RE: You useful idiots...

Nov 19, 2007 12:34     

"Well, Al fooled you by 'inconveniently' compressing the timeline (X-axis) to meet his agenda. Stretch that timeline out, and include a plot of solar activity (sun spot observations) and you'll see what approx. 1/2 of the scientists in the IPCC were saying all along... GLOBAL WARMING IS NOT CAUSED BY MAN. ITS THE SUN, STUPID!" Uh-huh. 600,000 years is just too short. Oh and not the dumb sun spot argument (seriously, the oil lobbyists can't come up with anything more imaginative? I'm sure you guys could do something with aliens, it would be more entertaining!). Solar activity has not changed in the last 100 years (when the warming has happened) and cannot account for the higher temperatures. Do the correct research, and don't go to the "junkscience" website. Talk to real scientists who do RESEARCH and not LOBBYING.

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useful idiot???

Nov 19, 2007 12:48     

please see: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/09/060914095559.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070419114538.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/10/041001092000.htm
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Hello!??

Nov 19, 2007 14:08     

Engineer, that 144% is self-sustaining! That means no energy input and 144% output, kind of like a chain reaction effect - self-sustaining! There is a reason why you wouldn't burn the biomas, one is that it isn't as efficient, another is the whole purpose of creating H2 is portability! If you burned biomass in some generator then your efficiency will go way down, parhaps to 40% or 60% combined cycle. The stociometric equation is 02 acetic acid -> 2CO2 2H2

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RE: useful idiot???

Nov 21, 2007 00:41     

I remain unconvinced. Your first link doesn't disprove the solar activity theory, and the author only makes an implication that . Your second link is even less impressive. The professor gives himself away at the very end, stating that he "chooses to believe" that the data supporting man-made global warming is "significant enough." I don't. What's more, real science is unbiased. Just the fact, ma'am. And your third link was dead. Read this one, and ask yourself why anyone would want to distort the facts so drastically that it crosses the line into falsehood: http://scienceandpublicpolicy....rrors.html

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RE:RE: You useful idiots...

Nov 21, 2007 00:45     

You want to talk about lobbying? OK. Here's where lobbying on the side of alarmism gets you. This is the EPA's assessment, not mine: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,299419,00.html
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Why would we want an energy source that produces wa...

Nov 27, 2007 11:13     

Why would we want an energy source that produces water vapor when water vapor far and away is the biggest greenhouse gas around? Water vapor contributes WAY more than CO2 in greenhouse gasses. [Water vapor falls back down to the Earth, thereby negating its permanent, long-term effects. -Rick]
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Re: You useful idiots...

Nov 30, 2007 18:17     

What ever happened to leaving a small footprint? Modern civilization considers it perfectly acceptable to destroy native life, in the form of plants and animals, all across the world in order to extract fossil fuels and minerals. Modern civilization considers it perfectly acceptable to extract vast quantities of fish and marine life from the oceans for human consumption. Modern civilization considers it perfectly acceptable to dump vast quantities of chemicals, fertilizers, pesticides, and manure onto the land and into streams, rivers and oceans. Humankind can either choose the responsible path or the irresponsible path, the choice is ours. By using renewable energy sources that don't fundamentally change the balance of atmospheric particles, by farming fish and marine life for consumption outside of the oceans in self contained ponds, and by not dumping chemicals, fertilizers, pesticides, and manure into the environment, we would be choosing to leave a small footprint. Global Warming does have a lot of evidence to back it up but there are some questions and no doubt Al Gore's influence has been divisive convincing many partisan Republicans that it is not real. The fundamental issue isn't whether or not Global Warming is real. The fundamental issue is whether or not we are screwing with something we don't fully understand. It's fine when messing around on one's home PC and you the owner are the only one who might suffer consequences. When the entire planet might suffer the consequences it is time to behave responsibly.

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Another energy farse

Dec 04, 2007 23:21     

Forget about the shortage of arable land relative to human population. Take farmland out of food production and place seeds on it using a diesel powered tractor. Grow those seeds into ineffecient solar panels using natural gas based fertilizers and petroleum based pesticides sprayed by diesel powered tractors or gas powered planes. etc etc. These 'solutions' are net energy users. Displacing needed resources and using about 4 calories to get 1 calorie back typically. They can only offer a small amount of energy recycled from our wasteful system via handling biological waste with energy recovery in mind. But they do distract the peasants for a while.

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Re: Plants Again

Mar 15, 2008 20:50     

While I agree with you about the governments and businesses profiting and that in general and that we are all a bunch of morons (Yes myself included), I will also agree with you about the rain forests, however where the good logging industries actually plant more trees than they cut down and that there are more trees in the US now than there was at the turn of the 20th century. Quite possibly the excess of the burning of hydrogen being the O2 will help to cure droughts that cause the forest fires and brush fires in which put so much more "green house gases" into the atmosphere than most people can imagine. Possibly this whole "global warming" process is natural and part of the Earths natural cycle, who knows??? (remember a few hundred years ago the earth was the center of the universe and the Earth was flat). Now as far as the soup goes if it can by fed food that has already been grown as food that has gone bad, or the byproducts from food manufacturers, and trash from restaurants, or lawn clippings may make this set up a little better looking as it can also help decrease what is in our landfills, without taking food off peoples tables, and the gases that are given off from them.

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