fairfolio
Saved Projects

Garbage Is a Waste: An Experiment to Determine if Garbage Can Be Used to Generate Electricity as a Benefit to Society

CSEF · 2006 Environmental Engineering

Katelyn N. Reeves · Pinecrest Elementary School, Thousand Oaks

Overview

Objectives/Goals The objective is to determine if a flammable gas can be produced from decaying garbage. Methods/Materials This study simulates decaying garbage by using pre-soaked pinto beans sealed inside two plastic zip-lock baggies to create an air-tight environment. Three sets of samples were prepared; the first set of pinto beans was placed in direct sunlight, the second set was placed in a shady area, and the last set was placed in a dark area. These samples were used to examine the effect of sunlight and temperature on decaying garbage. Gas production and ambient temperature data were gathered on a daily basis. After observing that the gas production had peaked, the baggies were held over a lighted candle to see if the gas produced was flammable. Results Graphical results, produced from daily observations, indicate that pinto beans produce a gas and produce more gas when placed in sunlight and at higher outside temperatures. Photographic results indicate decaying pinto beans produce a flammable gas. Conclusions/Discussion My hypothesis is that decaying garbage creates flammable gases because garbage has a foul smell which could be created by flammable gases. Graphical results support this hypothesis because the plastic baggies containing decaying pinto beans bulged over time indicating gas formation. Photographic results show that when the baggies were held above a lighted candle, there was some additional flame that was probably caused by the gas because the bags with the most gas had more flame. My experiment expands our knowledge because it indicates garbage (pinto beans) can be used to make electricity. Disposing of garbage without using it for environmentally beneficial purposes is a waste.

Summary statement

My experiment was to learn whether decaying garbage can produce a gas, what environmental conditions produce the most gas, whether the produced gas is flammable, and finally speculate whether such gas can be used to produce electricity.

Help received

I discussed how to organize my daily observations with my parents. For safety, my parents helped me with testing the combustibility of the gas produced from the beans and simultaneously taking still photographs of the flames.

Competition history

  • CSEF 2006 Environmental Engineering · Entry J0817

Resources

Related projects

Closest projects by meaning, across every fair and year in the corpus.

Browse more like this

Source: California Science & Engineering Fair public projects

Save projects to your library

Sign in with Google to keep track of projects you find interesting, organized into folders. An account also raises your daily allowance for “Has this been done?”, and lets you create a key for the MCP server with a much higher limit than anonymous use. Browsing stays public.

Continue with Google