A Renewable That Could Pollute More Than Non - Renewables

Every green lover (sometimes non green lovers too) will feel enthusiastic when some one show a new method for producing Electricity from waste. They won't even fail to praise (even I won't) those innovative ideas of generating Electricity from waste and unfortunately they forgets to analyze how the Electricity is generated. Some times this waste to energy conversion may be harmful than that of some other methods of generating Electricity, like from coal.

Waste To Electricity Conversion. Image Credit : tx.us

Recently, I went to a college exhibition where they placed a miniaturized (not so small) model of Waste to Energy converter. Like the most of the existing converters, they too employed the method of burning the waste and then converting the heat generated into electricity. When I asked the student who gave the demo of that converter, "don't you think it could still pollute our environment?". He saw me like an unresolved quest and asked me "how?".

This is because, most of the people's forget to talk about the by-products generated through this burning of waste. Although the by-products generated varies according to the type of wastes that we burn, but they mostly were plastic and electronic wastes. When we burn these type of wastes, they not only increase the carbon footprint but also pollute the environment through harmful mercury, lead, ash and other polluting gases. They were strong enough to bring in the acid rains to your city and cause some severe damages to human health.

Image Credit : Green Building Press (UK)

I do support the waste to energy conversion, than any one else, just because they solve two of our problems. First by clearing the tonnes and tonnes of wastage that were keept on stealing more space in our earth and then by generating Electricity, that runs our present world. But, how do they do it also an important thing to be considered. It should be in a way, without polluting our environment. Next time when some one tell/show you a method for generating Electricity from waste, don't forget to ask them, "how do they do it?".

IMPACT OF RENEWABLE(DISTRIBUTED GENERATION) ENERGY IN POWER QUALITY IMPROVEMENT

       Long transmission is one of the main cause for electrical power loss. Even a high school kid may know this fact these days. But the power quality problem is not only due to these losses. Approximately 70 to 80% of all power quality problem can be attributed to faulty connections or wiring(a research says not me). Also some other things like harmonics, transients, electromagnetic interference and LPF(low power factor)also damage power quality but they all share the remaining 20-30% only. So we will worry about them later.

DISTRIBUTED GENERATING STATION

      Okay then, now how we are going to take care of the power quality problems due to long transmission power losses. Are we going to "lay superconductors instead of aluminium alloys and copper conductors?" or "increasing voltage level to extreme levels and implementing HVDC?". These things may happen(exclude that superconductor idea please), but with very large investment. This remedy measures also will look reasonable when we implement them for new long power transmission projects. Then what about the older lines staying out there wasting not only the power but also our money(for losses too we are paying the electricity boards).

       To resolve this problem we got to ask the help of renewable energy. The solar, wind, wave and some other power plants scattered all over a country can not only help us to meet the growing demands with depleting fossil fuels. They were like a bonus to us in resolving power quality problems. The irritating incidents like switching off of T.V's while watching a football game and shutting down of A.C in a hot day due to low voltage problems and faulty lines may end now. Integrating these scattered power houses(Distributed Generation) with the existing system surely can deliver us a good quality power. If a feeder from centralized generating station to your area encountered fault, don't worry you will still get power from a near by distributed generating station. For that we need to install solar, wind or whatever that suits to your geographic location.

But we got to be too careful while designing these integration of centralized system with distributed power generating system. Improper designing in power electronic devices may inject harmonics into the system which will further destroy the power quality instead of making it up.

DISTRIBUTED GENERATING STATION IMAGE SOURCE - http://www.performanceenergy.com

DENMARK'S FLAG IS GOING TO FLY HIGH BY WIND POWER - a revolution

          Denmark set itself as a role model for the whole world on implementing renewable energy and reducing carbon emission. when we go through what Denmark actually did, they found the correct resource which is available in plenty in their country and utilized them properly. Currently Denmark's generation capacity from wind power is around 25-30%. Germany is way ahead in wind power generation by installing wind turbines every day. England and U.S(which planned to get 30% of total demand from wind) are also heading towards mass production of electricity from wind power.

WIND TURBINE

          Although Denmark is not at the top of wind power generation countries list, they were setting an example to other countries by planning to produce 50% of their total demand from wind power. If they do so they will be the first country to become highly eco friendly. They were also working on making peoples to use electric cars and to further reduce the carbon emission. An island in Denmark called Samso have enough wind turbines to supply the whole island with 10% surplus in hand. The achievement in this island is that every turbine is owned by the local peoples in that island.

LARGE NUMBER OF TURBINES INSTALLED
TO FORM WIND FARM

          I'm not really flattered just because of the Denmark's plan of "50% from Wind". I really amazed by the Denmark's electricity export ability. Although Denmark is a small country, it is holding one third of the world wind power industry.  I also feel proud to be an Electrical Engineer. The reason is that you can't send the wind power to neighboring countries just because you got plenty of them, but you can send any energy to any area by changing them into "Electricity". While living in a country where there is a plenty of "Electricity Scarcity" with 3-5 hours power cut a day(now there is no current in my town, thank god i got my laptop), Denmark really looks like a role model in utilizing the resources we have without disturbing our eco system. I believe that Denmark's wind power will never let their flag down.

PIEZOELECTRIC ENERGY HARVESTER FROM VIBRATIONS - A MODULE FOR INDUSTRIAL APPLICATION

          This project is just an example of Vibrational Energy Harvesting. We can give whatever the vibrational source available as input. Also, here we are storing the obtained power it can be used for any purpose. If you want to eliminate battery then no problem just with the help of proper power conditioning circuit you can directly connect the obtained power to load. But make sure the continuous source of vibration before eliminating battery.

THIS IS THE BLOCK DIAGRAM FOR THE PIEZOELECTRIC ENERGY HARVESTER
FROM VIBRATIONS

THIS IS THE SET UP FOR UTILIZATION OF HARVESTED POWER

APPLICATION OF VIBRATIONAL ENERGY FROM ANY
VIBRATING SOURCE

AFTER THE APPLICATION OF VIBRATION THE INDICATOR GLOWS
INDICATING THE POWER GENERATED

NOW THE GENERATED POWER IS STORED IN BATTERY AFTER PROPERLY
CONVERTING IT INTO DC 

POWER FROM BATTERY IS GIVEN TO LOW POWER SENSOR - THERMISTOR

THEN THE POWER FROM BATTERY IS SUPPLIED TO LDR

FINALLY SUPPLYING IRDA

PIN CONFIGURATION FOR IRDA

THE NEXT THREE PICTURES SHOWS THE CONTROLLING OF SENSORS 

INTERFACING CIRCUIT OR CONNECTION DIAGRAM

OUTPUT OF THE PROJECT