Awesome Way to Deal With Garbage

Awesome Way to Deal With Garbage

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Popular Science reports that companies like Startech are blasting trash with plasma and producing clean fuels like hydrogen as a byproduct. Basically, you put tons of trash in one end of a plasma converter, and a superheated plasma arc obliterates the trash into its molecular components. The process is called "plasma gasification".

(visit the link for the full news article)

This looks like a fantastic way to deal with all the toxic waste and garbage piling up all around the world. The system has many incredible advantages:

- Almost anything can go in to it, including mild radioactive waste.

- It produces energy as it runs, which can run the facility itself, while excess is sold into the energy grid.

- No sorting of waste products is necessary. No recycling separation. ALL material can go in at the same time.

- It produces a gas containing CO and H2 gas, which can be processed and turned into fuels. The other product is a molten slag, which can be formed into glass, tiles, insulation, or used as a source of materials for further processing.

- Byproducts of the reactor can be sold for profit.


This seems like a fantastic process which would turn our huge, disgusting, polluted landfills into a source of revenue while it makes the world clean. Oil spills can be scooped up from shorelines and processed back into clean materials the beach is naturally formed from, and returned to pristine condition. Streets can be cleaned up, including all the garbage, grease, and toxic junk that accumulates from automobiles, and fed into this machine to dispose of it all cleanly, and permanently, while the machine returns usable raw materials and energy back to those who do the cleaning. The number of uses of this kind of machine boggles the mind. Ugly, poisonous, polluted areas can be restored simply and easily with this process.



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(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 5-2-2009 by username371]

Sounds awesome.
This sounds like a solution that is worth
looking in to.

Why do I feel that this tech will or has been
used to make a weapon for the military.

This article is almost a year old dated 02.23.07, so this thread will be moved to Science and Technology.

It sounds like Professor Brown's Mr. Fusion from "Back To The Future" has now become a reality. What will they think of next?

[edit on 5-2-2009 by LLoyd45]

without being funny.. this could be put to use diposing of deceaced bodies
and returning them to famile,s i suppose you could markite it like a lava lamp, lmao...

i saw this a while ago on the discovery channel, i think it takes a crapload of juice to fire this thing up. It turns it into a hard black lump, and that can be used for something useful, i forget what though. haven't heard of this being used as of late, looks like they swept another one under the rug.