Last year, the price of gasoline here in BC soared to over $1.40/liter. This had a huge impact on my disposable income. It aslo made me realise how dependant we have become on large corporations for our power/energy requirements. As a result of this I started looking for an alternative energy source.
I discovered what I think may be a solution for myself as well as many others looking to be freed form the power grid. The solution......wood gas. Wood gas has been around for almost a century and has been all but forgotten by the masses.
My intention is to inform the public that there is an alternative, and with the help of Jim Mason's GEK and a bit of knowledge, you can provide yourself with all of the power you need, regardless of your location.
The GEK is an excellent starting point for taking biomass and turning it into gaseous fuel that can run Internal combusiton engines for power generation and mobility, or gas furnaces. Unfortunately, the GEK is not a complete turn-key system for power generation. It is a work in progress and is constantly being improved on by Jim, myself and a growing community that are providing open source information to make the GEK better.
My goal is to help make the GEK into something that a lay-person can use without needing to learn about the technical aspects of gasification, but at the same time provide them the information, plans, materials should they decide to want to build what I am working on.
Knowledge is power.......and so is biomass.
Luc
The picture above shows my insulated hourglass design that I constructed. My hope is to sufficiently raise the core temperature in order to crack the tar. Although you can't see it this photo, the unit is completely filled with high temperature refractory castable. There are several holes underneath that I used for the filling/venting process. Once filled, I placed the unit in an oven and gradually increased the temperature to 250 degrees F over a period of 14hours. I have included drawings for this unit in dxf format as well.
I will be testing this unit shortly and will be posting results shortly.
Your input is welcomed.
Feb 17th
I'm up and running again. It's been a long process getting everything ready but here I am. I've taken video of the gas I'm producing. I think it looks pretty good. You'll have to let me know what your thoughts are. The true test is the tar test. I didn't have time to make a filter as it was getting very late and as I still hold a day job, I figured it was high time to shut it down for the night.
Luc modified GEK test run #2.MP4
This is a snap shot of my flame running the GEK at low speed.
I've been burning wood pellets made from pine. I'm not sure what the moisture content, but I think it is typical of regular wood pellets. I haven't had a chance to do a filter test, but I did have a quick look inside the fan and everything looks good with very little residue inside.
This is the auger feed that I came up with. The unit will fit under a large container that will allow the GEK to run for long periods so that I can tweak performance of the GEK. The auger will be controlled via microprocessor.
The container isn't shown here, but it is a sealed unit. You're right Jake. The auger does crush some of the pellets. Do you think this is going to have a big impact on my burn? Ideally, I would like to make a finer auger similar to the one that Jim fabricated, but I haven't had time to sit down and work out the details yet. I just needed something to allow me to have a long, controlled burn so that I can perform my testing. The nice thing with this is that it is modular and easily removeable.
Thank for the input. Keep it coming. I need your help to make this GEK better.
Cheers,
Luc