Providing a detour for organic waste on its way to the landfill can provide a cornucopia to harvest.

That’s exactly what Paul Sellew set out to accomplish. A few years ago, he saw an extraordinary option in converting organic waste into a series of viable products. He opted to divert organic waste from what had been the standard waste stream approach that fed organic trash like leaves, grass, food and animal waste to landfills, and manufacture revenue-generating products. As a result, Sellew and Nathan Gilliland founded Harvest Power in 2008 and set up shop in Waltham, MA.

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They look like instant coffee granules, but they are in fact sewage flakes – a highly combustible new renewable form of fuel that burns like woodchip and is being used for the first time to generate electricity for Britain’s largest water and sewerage company.

Thames Water has begun producing the flakes by drying sludge – the solids found in sewage – in a purpose-built machine at sewage works in Slough, Berkshire. In a not-so-green move, the company then takes the flakes by lorry to Crossness sewage works in Bexley, south-east London, where they are burnt off to generate electricity.

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Nature has unfathomable loads of passive energy, lying dormant in unknown territories. If prudently explored, these potential energy hubs can reduce our dependence on fossil fuel energy which is depleting at a rapid pace. At one point eventually “Time” will not give us a choice to rely on oil for energy, it will command us to switch over to renewable sources of energy or even other alternate sources of energy. A brief about a few of the alternate sources of energy is given below.

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Poop-Fueled Batteries May Be Available for Home Use in 5 Years

Raw sewage stinks, but did you know it is actually a hot commodity? Gaseous wastewater has the potential to be converted into energy-packed biofuel, powering city facilities worldwide. Soon, that noxious wastewater you’ve held your breath over could help power your home appliances through microbial fuel cell batteries!

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A pioneering new facility to generate energy from waste – one of the biggest of its kind in the UK, according to its makers – may not go ahead, owing to uncertainty over government renewable energy subsidies.

Air Products announced on Wednesday it had received planning permission from Stockton-on-Tees borough council for its first advanced gasification facility in the UK that would convert household and commercial waste to gas, producing enough energy for 50,000 homes and diverting 300,000 tonnes of waste a year from landfill.

But the company said that, despite gaining planning permission, it would be unable to finance the plant unless the government resolves questions around future subsidies for renewable energy.

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