Power

©  2009  Rose George

Thames Water released a press release last week announcing that they had saved £15 million on energy costs from using “poo power.” They burn sludge to get electricity. Great, but people in the time of Alexander the Great, who had elementary biogas digesters, knew that shit can create energy. It’s great that so many Thames plants use thermal destruction with energy recovery (burning “poo cake”, as Thames calls sludge, to get power); or Combined Heat and Power (CHP) generation using anaerobic digestion to get methane which is burned to harness power. But only 30 percent of UK wastewater plants do any energy recovery. I think that will change under pressure of money and sustainability targets. Sooner rather than later, please.