Alcohol as a Fuel: Recycling Wastes into Energy

Overview

Objectives/Goals I wanted to find out if a family could produce an alcohol fuel from their kitchen wastes that a household could consume on a regular basis. Also, I wanted to find out if the alcohol would burn cleanly and efficiently. Methods/Materials First, I made the apple mash, and allowed it to ferment for 6 days. Then I distilled it in a still that i made from a pressure cooker, 6 feet of copper tubing which i coiled, a coffee can with the top and bottom removed, and a tray full of ice. I used a burner to boil the alcohol in the pressure cooker, and the vapors went up through the copper tubing, then condensed in the ice, and the distilled alcohol came out into a beaker. I used beakers and oil-burning lamps to burn the alcohol to test the burning efficiency of it. Results The alcohol produced was a very clean-burning alcohol, but it did not have a very long burning time. The longest time that I was able to get from 100 mls. of the alcohol was 5 minutes and 30 seconds in the oil burning lamp. It didn't burn very well in the lamp, so my science teacher (my project advisor)threw a lit match into a beaker of the alcohol, and the vapors lit very well. Conclusions/Discussion I don't think that a family could really run on this alcohol on a daily basis if it is not mixed with something that will give it a longer burning time. It is a very clean fuel, so it would be good for our valley and the areas around us with bad air pollution problems. We should investigate using a fuel like ethyl alcohol, because it is a much cleaner fuel and is not a limited resource.

Competition history

• CSEF 2002 Environmental Engineering · Entry J0810

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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