A few weeks ago, in a post (THE CF M PROJECT update to 19 03 2019) we analyzed another important aspect of compost, considering the product not only as a fertilizer to be used in organic farming, which is certainly important, but we have analyzed together the biodegradation process that transforms biomass in compost, during all the steps we analyzed the state of the biomass in the composter and the physical-chemical aspects that the biomass goes through, noting in fact the possibility of being able to recover part of the gaseous mixture that the process generates having the possibility of reuse it, thus introducing the definition of biodigester and of a biodigestion and co-generation plant. Therefore the composting process not only allows a biomass (consisting of an organic part and another vegetable part) to be transformed into a highly nutritious product for plants and fertilizer, but also in a production process of energy raw material that it can be reused as an energy component for heating (biogas) or it can be converted into electricity. As already mentioned, the entire production cycle consists of implementing a Rankine Cycle which, for the less experienced, consists of a cyclical thermodynamic transformation through which it is possible to convert thermal energy into mechanical energy and therefore into Work. I intend to investigate precisely this aspect with you in order to make an apparently abstract aspect understandable but that instead is feasible to the extent possible and has already been implemented in many waste disposal plants in many Northern European countries. I will try not to go into too much detail, in the technicalities of the subject, I will try to make the post understandable to a wide network of readers that includes even the less experienced.

THE SOURCES OF ENERGY

At the base of the energy production chain, there are different procedures to be applied on the raw material, each of them must be carefully analyzed and studied by technicians and engineers in order to evaluate their rability, the limits within which some transformations can be made with good approximation to ideality of the procedure, but above all it must be analyzed the environmental impact that the products of some transformations may have. We know that even today the majority share of the energy component that satisfies world demand comes from fossil sources, the production and transformation process of this raw material (fossil carbon) inevitably generates a harmful component that, if dispersed in the air (and this happens very frequently), involves an increase in the presence of polluting gaseous substances in the air that we all breathe with disastrous consequences not only on people's health but above all on the health of the animals and plants which, as we know very well, find in the air their main source of nutrition. An excessive release of these substances in the air causes a thinning of the layer of ozone that protects the earth's crust from the violent penetration of the sun's rays by acting as a filter, this would therefore involve a complete penetration of the sun's rays and therefore an accentuation of the desertification phenomenon and recording long periods of drought. actually altering the atmospheric balance of the Planet. All these considerations therefore push science and research to find alternative sources for the production of energy, giving life to a new branch of science, which then became a real culture, which takes the name of Green Energy. In this case, different methods for the production of renewable energy are included, many of which are known and already functioning, but many others are still unknown and difficult to implement, for various reasons, both logistic and territorial. This is the case of the so-called energy crops, whose reproduction and replication on a large scale finds problems of no small importance both from the climatic and biological point of view. What we want instead to analyze in this post are instead the methodologies thanks to which these raw materials can be transformed into energy, more specifically into electricity.

WHAT IS A RANKINE CYCLE

A Rankine Cycle consists of a cyclic series of thermodynamic transformations carried out by a plant, which can be realized with different fluids, for simplicity of understanding we can imagine that this plant works by making simple water flow inside it. It consists of the series connection of the following components: a pump, a boiler, a turbine and a condenser. The process we want to analyze is representative of a real plant, so I will not dwell on the ideal aspect of the transformations in play, so we will assume the always real transformations. A scheme like the one below could make the idea of ​​a plant we want to analyze.

Image CC2.0 Creative Commons, Rankine Cycle Plant

The fluid is taken from the condenser and passed into the pump, during this first phase the fluid is subjected to a transformation of adiabatic compression, at the end of this first transformation the water is brought to a pressure equal to that present in the boiler vaporiser, in this component therefore the water undergoes heating at constant pressure until it reaches the saturation temperature (at this point the fluid is in the state of saturated liquid) . The fluid is evaporated evolving in the state of saturated steam to then be sent to the turbine. In the Turbine the fluid is made expand adiabatically so as to produce Mechanical Work (just at this point of the process cogeneration can occur transforming mechanical energy into electrical energy or exploiting the residual heat of the evaporation of the fluid in the condenser), once expanded the fluid is again sent to the condenser where it will return to the state of saturated liquid to then repeat the cycle.

Image taken from the Edutecnica website

THE POTENTIAL

The mechanism described above is also implemented on modern environmental heating devices such as pellet stoves with procedures that are always at the forefront to optimize energy consumption, I am talking about the latest generation stoves. The potential of the process is obvious, moreover, reproducing it on a large scale would be a great conquest of technology, this is already happening in many countries, even here in Italy in the Pinerolo plant in Piemonte Region (Pinerolo Ecological Park) that thanks to the participation of 47 Municipalities of the province, is able to supply of thermal energy the city of Pinerolo managing to heat approximately 2 thousand homes (we are trying to optimize the processes and expand the infrastructure so that the plant can cover a larger area) thanks to the district heating network, not only that, the control panel is able to support itself generating a quantity of energy such as to dedicate a part of it to the system to keep itself up to speed and therefore manage itself. All this is surprising and replicating these models of Circular Economy throughout the European territory would be great. The Company disposes of approximately 42 tons of organic waste deriving from separate collection and coming from the entire province of Turin thanks to which it produces biomethane and biohydrogen together with a considerable quantity of compost ready to be resold in bulk to farmers and florists.

THE CF-M PROJECT TARGETS FOR THE FUTURE

This model is certainly the ideal target to reach for the establishment of a global circular economy, obviously being able to realize such a system requires numerous efforts and sacrifices, what the CooperFelix-Multiservices Team proposes to do is to act by step:

• to realize first of all a company that sensitize public opinion to an eco-sustainable way of life and above all that manages to inform people that this is achievable

• growing on the territory and elsewhere, reselling quality compost to farms by encouraging organic farming and on the Steemit platform, opening our product market to potential customers residing in other places in the world, increasing the number of users aware of Blockchain technology of steem

• to enter into high-level managerial contexts for the construction of cogeneration plants in the Campania Region in collaboration with local authorities

We are visionaries but we believe that nothing is impossible, just believe it.

Whoever says something is impossible should not disturb those who are doing it
(Albert Einstein)

The image is subject to copyright