You will never feel the same about going to the bathroom after you hear about Toyota’s poop powered car plans.
The engineers at the Japanese car manufacturing giant Toyota have come up with a great way to power their hydrogen fueled models, the answer lies in human feces.
Currently, people are hesitant to buy hydrogen powered cars since there aren’t many hydrogen refueling stations around. On the other hand, fuel companies are hesitant to invest in hydrogen fuel stations since few people are driving hydrogen powered cars. This paradoxical dilemma has hindered the human population of adopting more environmentally friendly means of transportation, but Toyota has a plan.
The company has started producing hydrogen from human feces at a wastewater treatment plant in Fukuoka, which can be used to power their hydrogen fueled Mirai.
The process begins by the separation of the solids, called sewage sludge, from the liquids, which are then mixed with microorganisms that breakdown the sewage sludge into biogas, 60% methane and 40% carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide is then filtered out and replaced with water, which creates hydrogen as well as more carbon dioxide, which is in its turn removed to leave behind pure hydrogen gas.
At the Fukuoka plant, they are currently producing around 300 kilograms of hydrogen daily, which is about enough to fuel 65 Mirai vehicles, but has the capacity to fuel up to 600 cars daily if all the biogas produced there was turned into hydrogen.
Hydrogen-from-poop powered vehicles are not only environmentally friendly and can help use reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but they should also be economically friendly as they basically run on waste.
California, where Toyota’s Mirai could gain popularity, has around 20 hydrogen fuel stations, mostly in LA and the San Francisco Bay area. Their hydrogen is created from sewage as well by a plant in Fountain Valley, since the state law requires that one third of all hydrogen produced in California is made from renewable sources.
The hydrogen create from sewage can also be used to power other things, as it can be used to create green electricity. Now we all know how the people sitting on oil reserves felt once they discovered their worth.
