Thursday, January 31, 2013

Next time, Doc, fill 'er up over in Collinwood




In 1985, we all were wholly entertained by Doc and Marty and a souped-up DeLoreon that could travel through time courtesy of the dregs Doc pulled out of Marti's trash and the DeLoreon's handy on-board Mr. Fusion.

Well folks, you don't need to wait until 2015. We're fueling vehicles with banana peels and stale hot dog buns right now--and I'm not talking about a few gurgling test tubes and beakers in some lab. Anaerobic digesters are popping up all over Ohio. I know. I wrote about them in my feature for the latest edition of hiVelocity.

I visited such an installation in Collinwood, which is an old-time Cleveland neighborhood where Quasar Energy operates an anaerobic digester. (Thusly named because it eats and processes food much like we do, with similar results. Keep the 7th grade humor to yourselves, please.)

People, these systems take just about any organic substance that has a BTU value and transform it into natural gas and fertilizer.

Refinery? We don't need no stinkin' refinery.

Quasar's tanks framed by the Cleveland sky.


The only problem I had with this story is that ever since I began the research, I wince each time I toss a potato peel or dump the coffee grounds while thinking, this should be fueling the Mini.

Back to the future indeed.

* * *

4 comments:

Joe said...

A guy I know locally runs his car on old used vegetable oil he collects from local restaurants. There is a big plastic tank in his backseat.

Erin O'Brien said...

I heard the exhaust on those vehicles smells like french fries.

I'd be hungry all the time!

Anonymous said...

Grill Baby, Grill.

RJ

Anonymous said...

Speaking of smelling of french fries, do you think this Burger King horsemeat scandal will "Trigger" a stock sell-off?