4 ms·

I think it's much easier to make your own electricity than to make your own petrol if it comes to that.

• pinkfoot 7y ago
  Pyrolysis (at a reasonably large scale) can make acceptable diesel out of plastic, biowaste, or cooking oil.
  • mikestew 7y ago
    I’m no chemical engineer, but just the fact that I’ve never heard that word tells me I’m not doing that in my garage after an emergency. I’m going with self-generated electricity. That I know several ways of doing, from common household materials.
    • dsfyu404ed 7y ago
      Bio-diesel was a big thing 10+yr ago when restaurants used to have waste oil they had to pay to get rid of. Now they all the restaurants have some recycler that comes around and picks it up (who presumably sells it in bulk to someone who processes it into something). A diesel engine will burn basically any oily substance if you can find a way to get it into the engine without clogging up the plumbing bits. Nobody does it anymore because it's not cheap anymore and environmentalist circles have shifted to electric or anti-car whereas 10+yr ago biofuel was seen as a way to not drill in the arctic or spill oil in the gulf.
    • pinkfoot 7y ago
      > I’m no chemical engineer I am a chemist. :) Its standard petro-chemistry as long as you NEVER put PVC plastic into the digester - then you get dioxins. Which are nasty. In principle, you can distil the diesel and capture the methane gaseous fraction to heat the next batch. The real challenge is the variable inputs has a huge impact on the diesel recovery - which is why you need some scale to smooth out the variances. On a small scale its often not economical. But farmers do this all the time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrolysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrolysis
    • ppf 7y ago
      Out of interest, how would you do this, and how much power do you expect to generate?
      • mikestew 7y ago
        If it came down to it, I could make one of the world's most inefficient electrical generators with some wire and some magnets. More specifically, we have potential electrical generators all around us. Anything with an electrical motor can potential be reversed to generate. So I don't have anything specific in mind, nor any numbers to work with, but I'm confident I'd figure something out. I'm a likely to have more success with that than I am making diesel in my garage.
        • ppf 7y ago
          You'd need a few machine shop tools to make your own generator, as well as access to magnets and other specific materials (iron laminations, etc), as well as a good understanding of magnetics. I think you underestimate what 'world's least effecient generator' means - if energy suddenly became scarce, I wouldn't spend my time to make something that would probably make a few watts at best. Your best bet, if you really want electrical power in this scenario, is to reuse a motor or car alternator. Now the biggest issue is a source of power - unless you have access to a flowing river, you're pretty much stuck with wind. And here, you'll be limited by your ability to make efficient blades. In fact, your best power source might be you, using a bike-mounted generator. I've though about makig one for fun, but it's a lot of effort to go through, to make a device that would probably make 150W. Realistically, IMHO in this scenario I would abandon electronic devices and stick to hand tools.
• dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  It's much harder and more expensive stock up on electricity thank liquid fuel if you know your source is going to be unreliable.