Britian Homes To Be Powered With Gas Produced From Sewage

NewImage

Water firms to pipe biomethane gas generated at sewage-treatment works into Britain’s homes. via The Independent

Thousands of UK residents will soon be cooking with “poo-power”‘. In a national first, water firms including Severn Trent, Wessex Water and Northumbrian Water are preparing to pipe a continuous supply of biomethane gas directly from sewage-treatment plants into the National Grid.

“Our customers could be at home frying sausages on gas generated at our sewage treatment works,” said Mohammed Saddiq, general manager of GENeco, Wessex Water’s energy company.

In the past, water firms have used gas produced in sewage treatment to generate electricity on site, but this will be the first time advanced technology to treat methane will produce high-quality biomethane suitable for use in homes.

Dragan Savic, a Professor of Hydroinformatics at Exeter University, said that given the UK had more than 9,000 sewage treatment works, “poo-power” could hold substantial environmental benefits.

“Greenhouse-gas emissions reductions could be significant as the methane normally generated at sewage works is 25 times more harmful to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide,” he said. “By capturing methane and pumping it into the National Grid water companies could turn from greenhouse-gas emitters into renewable-energy generators.”

According to the latest data from the Environment Agency, the UK water industry, per year, consumes around 8,100 gigawatt hours (GWh) and generates over 4 million tons of greenhouse-gas emissions.

Some English water firms, including Anglian Water, South West Water, Yorkshire Water, and Southern Water, already have Combined Heat and Power plants where gas produced in water treatment is burnt to produce electricity, which is used to power the plant. In some cases excess is sold on to the Grid. Welsh Water and Scottish Water also generate renewable energy in this way.

“Although it’s a little unsavoury, there’s lots and lots of power locked in poo, and when processed it’s perfect to generate clean renewable green gas”, said Severn Trent Water’s Simon Farris.”It’s also important for lowering our energy costs… so that we can pass those on to customers.”

Read more


Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Join Adafruit on Mastodon

Adafruit is on Mastodon, join in! adafruit.com/mastodon

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 36,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


Maker Business — “Packaging” chips in the US

Wearables — Enclosures help fight body humidity in costumes

Electronics — Transformers: More than meets the eye!

Python for Microcontrollers — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: Silicon Labs introduces CircuitPython support, and more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Guardian Robot, Weather-wise Umbrella Stand, and more!

Microsoft MakeCode — MakeCode Thank You!

EYE on NPI — Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — #NewProds 7/19/23 Feat. Adafruit Matrix Portal S3 CircuitPython Powered Internet Display!

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.