This California Dairy Farm's Secret Ingredient for Clean Electricity: Cow Poop

[WhiteTara]

5. here's the secret

The problem is that most of these places use a combustion engine to run the processes that actually make electricity. The green benefits that come from finding a new use for waste are basically wiped out by the greenhouse gasses these engines pump into the air.

This is where fuel cells lend a helping hand, since they don’t spew out carbon dioxide as a byproduct when running the methane-to-electricity reactions. Bar 20 Dairy uses solid oxide fuel cells made by San Jose-based company Bloom Energy. They consist of an anode, a cathode, and an electrolyte that’s sandwiched between two interconnected plates. As methane flows through the anode side and air passes through the cathode side, it causes a chemical reaction in the electrons which produces electricity, with practically zero carbon dioxide byproduct.

The result is a self-sustaining, clean energy microgrid: something Bar 20 Dairy’s Steve Sheheady and his family have been trying to establish for years.