Britain’s biggest water company lifted the lid on how it slashed costs by burning customers’ faeces to make electricity.
Thames Water said “poo power” saved them £15 million (NT$786 million) last year by generating renewable energy from the foulest of sources.
The company, which handles the waste of 13.6 million people in London and the River Thames valley, said it had met 14 percent of its energy needs by either burning sewage or methane derived from it in 2008-2009.
Energy is generated through either “thermal destruction,” where dried blocks of “poo cake” are burned, or “anaerobic digestion,” where the methane from sewage sludge is burned.
“There’s no polite way of saying this but what we produce — our poo — isn’t simply waste, it’s a great source of energy,” said Keith Colquhoun, Thames Water’s climate change strategy manager.
“That’s good news because we treat 2.8 billion liters of sewage every day at our 349 sewage works. The solids in sewage have a high calorific content that we use to generate electricity.”
Colquhoun said everyone had to muck in and urged delegates at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen to produce more than just hot air.
“It’s about all of us taking action — and in our case, that includes poo power,” he said.
(AFP)
英國最大的水公司揭露其大幅降低成本的發電方法──焚燒顧客的糞便。
泰晤士水公司表示，他們將這萬臭之源轉化為再生能源，「便便發電」去年替他們省下了一千五百萬英鎊（新台幣七億八千六百萬元）。
負責處理倫敦和泰晤士河谷地區一千三百萬居民排泄物的該公司表示，二ＯＯ八年到二ＯＯ九年間，他們靠著焚燒水肥或從糞便中提煉出甲烷的方式，供應該地區一成四的電力需求。
其發電方式有二，一是透過焚燒乾糞磚的「熱解」技術，一是利用焚燒水肥所產生之甲烷的「厭氧消化」方式。
泰晤士水公司氣候變遷策略經理基斯．柯恩寬說：「談這個可能不太禮貌，不過我們所生產的（糞便）不僅僅是廢物，也是種絕佳的能源。」
「這是個好消息，因為我們三百四十九個污水處理廠每天要處理二十八億公升的水肥。污水中的固體蘊藏高熱能，可以用來發電。」
柯恩寬說，每個人都應該盡一己之力，呼籲聯合國哥本哈根氣候變遷大會的代表不要只說空話，要拿出點成績來。
他說：「我們全體都應該要採取行動─以我們公司而言，就包括了便便發電。」
（法新社╱翻譯：袁星塵）
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