Jason Williams

How much electricity can organic waste produce?

Organic waste is a biodegradable material that comes from plants and animals. What if it were possible to generate electricity from naturally occurring waste? Well, it is possible! Keep reading to find out just how much electricity organic waste can produce.

Norbert Juma

Norbert Juma

Norbert Juma, Lead Editor at Everyday Power.

Up to 1000 Megawatts

Organic waste can generate electricity. This is called biomass energy. This energy is produced from decaying organisms like plants (soy, corn, wheat, etc.) and algae. They can even come from animal wastes such as fecal matter and sewage from homes.

Microorganisms act upon this organic matter, which is then followed by several heating procedures to generate thermal energy.

This thermal energy can be converted to electricity or biofuels. Biofuels, like ethanol and biodiesel, can be used to run engines and vehicles.

According to literature, biomass or organic wastes can produce up to 1000 megawatts of electricity.

Jason Williams

Jason Williams

Jason Williams from Automatelife.net.

More Organic Waste Produces More Power

Bioorganic waste has a lot of promise for recovering green energy. This garbage is fermented to produce biogas, which can then be refined to natural gas grade and sent to the grid, or used to generate heat or electricity.

1000 kg of mixed food waste per day can produce 180 cubic meters of methane and around 600kW of power.

Caio Bersot

Caio Bersot

Caio Bersot is an energy analyst at EnergyRates.ca.

Depends on the Power Plant

Organic waste can be transformed into biogas, which can be used to generate electricity. In the province of Ontario, Canada, 60% of the biogas produced is for power generation.

The [amount] of electricity generated via organic waste depends on the power plant’s capacity and the quantity of organic matter it supports. For instance, one of Canada’s main biomass stations generated about 205 megawatts of electricity last year, which is enough to power more than 68,000 households and small commercial facilities.

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