Turning poop into fuel

You gotta hand it to people who are creating real-world solutions to real-world problems. Giant solar-collecting space lasers are pretty cool -- but Sintex is for real.

The Indian plastics company has created a very simple "digester" that takes something we have too much of (poop) and turns it into something we don't have enough of (energy).

This digester can actually take any organic material, including agricultural waste, kitchen scraps, or cow dung, and convert it to methane. This happens naturally, of course, and is happening in your septic tank (or at your sewage treatment plant) right now.

The difference is that Sintex's biogas reactor has a little tube that moves the methane into a storage container. From there, the methane can be used for any natural gas application, such as cooking, drying clothes, heating the home, boiling water, etc.

A "primed" digester (primed with cow dung, for a source of good bacteria) can digest all the waste of a four-person household and produce enough energy for that household to cook all of its meals! The device costs $425 and will pay for itself in less than two years.

The Indian government has agreed to subsidize 1/3 of the cost of the units. In theory, that will actually save the government money, as they won't have to deal with the waste in other ways.

Sintex has only installed about 100 of the devices ... but just wait. When real-world problems get real-world solutions, it's hard to hold them back from success.

Via Forbes