Energy from rubbish

TheVoiceofRussia: Energy from rubbish
"Symptomatically, both of today’s winners of the Global Energy prize get their awards for finding new ways to save energy and make the economy more effective in energy terms. This means that the efficiency of energy use is of prime global importance in this day and age."

That was President Dmitry Medvedev speaking at a St Petersburg ceremony to award the Global Energy prizes to the American physicist Professor Arthur Rosenfeld and his Russian colleague Professor Philipp Rutberg, of St Petersburg’s Electrophysics Institute.

We offer extracts from an award speech by Professor Rutberg:

"In recent decades, each major breakthrough in fundamental science quickly produced spin-offs in the form of commercial applications. This was the case with discoveries in nuclear physics, and this is now the case with achievements in the physics of plasma."

A stream of low-temperature plasma heated to between 2,000 and 10,000 Celsius – the surface of the Sun is heated to 6,000, for a reference point – can, among other things, successfully decompose household rubbish. It does this in an environmentally-friendly way which also generates fuel:

"Instead of going into landfills or polluting the atmosphere after incineration, rubbish is now a valuable energy source. Treated with plasma, it yields a combustible carbohydrate gas which can be used for fuelling gas turbines and for producing liquid motor fuels."

The technology is already in commercial use in Japan, the United States and countries in Europe. Experts believe it offers a good way to augment green energy supply around the world.

The Global Energy prizes have been awarded annually since 2003. They are widely seen as energy science equivalents of the Nobel Prizes. Each winner gets a cheque for a million American dollars.