Methane Biogas Car Powers Up

British engineers have developed a pioneering biogas-powered car capable of covering 10,000 miles off the human waste flushed away by 70 households.

The so-called ‘Bio-Bug’ is based on a traditional Volkswagen Beetle car but incorporates 21st century renewable energy technologies. Thought to be the first VW Beetle in the UK to run on waste-derived methane gas, the Bio-Bug is a product of UK sustainable firm GENeco.

The Bio-Bug is a semi-hybrid petrol/biogas technology demonstrator that draws both on petrol and on biogas. That petrol element is kick-started when the ignition key is turned to start the vehicle but as soon as the engine reaches optimum temperature, the power source switches over to the biogas, and it only goes back to the petrol again when there’s no more biogas left.

Bio-Bug Methane Car

With a top speed of 114 miles per hour, the Bio-Bug’s methane car performance is comparable to traditionally-powered car designs, as a GENeco representative explained.

“Previously the gas hasn’t been ‘clean’ enough to fuel motor vehicles without it affecting performance”, the firm’s Mohammed Saddiq stated in a company press release. “However, through using the latest technology our Bio-Bug drives like any conventional car and what’s more it uses sustainable fuel.”

While human waste sourced from UK homes is presently used to power the Bio-Bug, treated food waste is set to be used soon, Saddiq added.

Biogas Car Fuel

As of August 2010, Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) is being used by multiple different companies as a fuel source for buses and other forms of transport. Far fewer firms are drawing on waste-derived biogas, but GENeco’s owners, Wessex Water, produce approximately 18m cubic metres per annum. This gas is produced via anaerobic digestion: a process through which minute organisms deconstruct biodegradable material in the absence of oxygen to create methane.

According to GENeco, 19,000 tons of carbon dioxide would be prevented from entering the atmosphere if the firm’s total biogas output was used as a motor vehicle fuel source.

“If you were to drive the car you wouldn’t know it was powered by biogas as it performs just like any conventional car”, Saddiq added. “It is probably the most sustainable car around.”

So long as the Bio-Bug produces successful trial results, GENeco will potentially retrofit the same technology into other vehicles, too. Enviro News will present further coverage of this waste-powered car’s progress in future News Items.

In related news, the publication of information concerning the Bio-Bug has coincided with the release of a new study asserting that car journeys ultimately contribute to global warming more than commercial aircraft flights.

The study writes that eventually, a car trip over a set distance will impact more on climate change than the same journey carried out by plane. It stresses, though, that air travel still has a greater short-term effect, due to the more immediate influence of aircraft emissions on high-altitude warming processes.

“As planes fly at high altitudes, their impact on ozone and clouds is disproportionately high, though short lived”, lead study author Doctor Jens Borken-Kleefeld of the International Institute for Applies Systems Analysis explains.

“Although the exact magnitude is uncertain, the net effect is a strong, short-term, temperature increase. Car travel emits more carbon dioxide than air travel per passenger mile. As carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere longer than the other gases, cars have a more harmful impact on climate change in the long term.”

Bio-Bug photo courtesy of Julian James Photography

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