Well, at least you don’t have to shovel it in…but I wonder…what sort of “new car smell” does this car have when it is fresh from the factory?
Get the poop on this story here. I foresee a future episode of Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe.
And, if this is the license plate of a Prius owner (which I spotted on I-5 in California)…
…what sort of vanity license plate would an owner of a car like this new Bio Bug have?
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I’m sure there’s a Schmidt joke in here somewhere…
Now that puppy is a prime candidate for emissions standards.
Comes complete with a pack of matches.
Waste not, want not.
It’s every squire’s dream come true.
Provides them with the opportunity to publicly talk shit instead of the usual wining about the gasoline prices.
The engineer claimed in BBC radio interviews this was a ‘first’ and a ‘new dawn’.
He’s about 60 years late – during the second world war many cars in Britain were converted to run on methane from chicken or pig manure. In 1964 a friend at school had one of these as his first car – but he had bottled gas on the back seat to run it from.
re: latitude
cesspool not carpool for the other 69 homes 😉
So do we call the Bio-Bug the Dung Beetle?
Manufacturer’s motto: From your tailpipe to my tailpipe…..
Vanity plate could be
URANUS
power
Yeah, I see several people caught the Daily Bayonet christening it as the Dung Beetle — perfect. You could market it to all those African Kleptocrats who say we owe them Trillion$ for AGW damage.
The point is not that cars can run on methane, it is that a clean energy source (CH4) is literally going to waste. Some waste water treatment plants have been using anarobic digestion in cleaning the water and using the byproduct methane to generate enough electricity to operate their facilities. Some factories are tapping landfills to provide their natural gas needs. North Carolina has an incentive program trying to get hog farms to convert their waste lagoons to usable methane generators. Methane is our best bet for a renewable energy resource.
Wasn’t it Olivia Newton John who sang “Let me hear your potty talk, your potty talk, let me hear your potty talk.”
Big deal, a car that runs on human waste. Congress has been doing this for decades.
Will the History Channel do a special on how the Templar Knights evolved to create the Methanic Temple where they worship at the alter of the Biomass fodder, the sun, and the holy poop?
Roger says:
August 6, 2010 at 4:57 pm
You’re right but thanks to the EPA “the cost to convert to CNG can range from about $12,500 to $22,500 depending on the vehicle, engine, size of CNG tanks needed, and who does the converting.”
http://www.greencar.com/articles/can-convert-natural-gas.php
Oh no, it’s much worse than Dung Beetle: meet the 2011 Green Gasser.
Buckle up in a Jolly Green Gasser today.
Also comes in a flashy Raspberry Red and a cool-blue Bronx Cheer.
Imitation is the sincerest form of Flatulence.
If we convert the Pope-mobile over to this technology it could be the poop-mobile instead. If we convert our police cars to this technology, they could be called pooper troopers.
I can see it now when the family goes on vacation. “We’re out of gas! Give me a bran muffin and some beans so I can fill up.”
I once had a car with a putt-putt engine that took forever to get to 65 MPH. If I had this, I would have a car with a poot-poot engine. The makers of such an engine can have the slogan: Your “business” is our business!
Sorry, I can’t resist such low-brow jokes. This actually is pretty neat. I just think they should have talked about getting methane from landfills instead of from sewage treatment plants. Too many potty jokes.
“A car that runs on methane gas produced from human waste has been launched and its makers claim drivers cannot tell the difference.”
Reminds me of the old Monty Python sketch: “I can’t tell the difference between Whizzo Butter and this dead crab!”
Thanks for all the great humor in this thread; great way to end the work week.
To the green movement: FLUSH 😀
I wonder if the Dung Beetle has the car seats modified into toilet seats to create a certain Zen oneness for the whole experience?
Perhaps Anthony could modify his electric commuter golf cart to test the hybrid aspects… or even add a fermenter on his roof to augment his solar experience. Sort of a new version of sh*t on a shingle.
Hay don’t knock it. CH4 is great stuff and should be used as transportation fuel. Maybe my clients could even sell some of their natural gas. Lots of it under then wheat fields of Alberta.
So you roll into the way station, or waste station, I guess, in your new Poupe De Ville and ask the shovelman to fill it with #2 and check the air freshener.
I think all Greenies should demand neighborhood based methane generators. Former ACORN employees could be rehired as the new neighborhood poop cops. A few new laws would have to be passed to deal with scofflaws and underperforming households though. Lets say your quota is 250lbs of waste per month per household. If you fall short for more than three months you would receive a “free” extra box of canned beans, lard, mystery meat, and expired cheese to process…er…eat. Simple.
Exemptions would be allowed for vegetarians and seniors. Not much extra energy in that cup of wheat bran. And extra large seniors might put a extra burden on the health care system, so we can’t have that. Children would not be counted either as we don’t want to encourage over eating among the younger set. Diabetics would be exempt too, as well as people with cancer, smokers, alcoholics, teetotalers, stomach ulcers, hangnails, skin blemishs, bad breath and any other life threatening disease you can think of.
In short only perfectly healthy overeaters would be forced to support the rest of society in the production of renewable energy.
Hmm….? Sound familiar?
Nothing new. A chicken farmer in Leominster MA has been running a Chicken Poop Pick Up (or is that a Poop Up) truck for close to twenty years.
Number crunching:
10,000 miles, 50 work weeks (allow 2 for vacation), 5 work days a week. Just 40 miles a day if only used for work. The “average” must be weighted towards city dwellers.
How many CO2 tonnes are released in the processing, storing, and delivery of the methane during an average year?
Which works out to enough for 9,540 “average” vehicles, provided said methane isn’t being used for anything else. At 70 homes a vehicle, 667,800 homes are supplying that one plant.
However, by the best numbers I can find, Wessex Water provides sewer service for 2.7 million customers with 405 treatment plants, thus 6,666 and 2/3 customers per plant.
Thus, roughly speaking, it appears this one particular plant is about 100 times larger than average, and Wessex Water must run a bunch of really small plants. Or someone has their numbers off in a way that makes the numbers look too optimistic. Or since sleep was really short and some time ago I am currently incapable of correctly using a calculator. Feel free to check my math.
Also for an “average” work week that’s 37.7 cubic meters of methane. What compression ratio would that be at what pressure to get a “once a week” fill up?
Also, notice how often with a wreck there’s fuel spilled. I’d want some very strong safeguards against the compressed methane causing an instant fireball.
And on roads that are level or *gasp* uphill?
Fun Stuff: Found in the Wikipedia “Optimized For Climate Change” methane entry:
Gee, and here I thought it was to prevent explosions and fires from methane buildup. Guess the Dreaded Global Warming-Inducing Dangers of the Powerful Greenhouse Gas methane were known and guarded against for, what, well over a half century by now?
Brown is the new green.