Friday, October 17, 2008 Wood produces electricity By Elisabeth P. Baumgart Sun.Star Correspondent
IT might look like an ordinary car on the outside, but getting people around town is not the only thing it can do.
“It’s the woodgas multi-cab survival implements that provides transport, electricity and other implements for sustainable
farming,” said inventor Ronald Go.
The car, which runs solely on woodgas, would be the answer in addressing the growing hunger and fuel problem.
“All it needs is wood for it to run and if it runs, it then can transport people and products to wherever they need to be. But better yet, it is designed in such a way, that when it is (idling), it can serve as a generator. You can have it run in order to have light, to generate energy, to run a water pumping system. And importantly, it can work as a plow, using a three-
thronged plow,” said Go.
The “woodgas multicab survival implements” essentially runs only on woodgas, which allows the car to operate and run all the other implements.
“Woodgas just requires the heating of wood to a desired temperature so that it will emit woodgas. The woodgas will be introduced to the engine where it will be used to power the engine,” said Go.
Go designed a wood gas reactor system that includes a wood fuel container, which carries wood chips, and a chamber where fire is fed to start combustion.
The gas that is produced by the heating of the wood powers the engine of the multi-cab. All the combustion occurs inside a reactor, so there is no risk of setting fire to the vehicle.
Survival implements
Once the engine runs, all other “survival implements” can be used during a given time.
The “survival implements,” or devices that can be attached to the system, are a shredder for the production of compost fertilizers, a briquette machine for the conversion of loose biomass into solid fuel, a mud pump to pump out long stored “humanure” for farming application and irrigation, a small corn mill, and any other machine that can be attached to it via belt.
Go hopes that through his invention, the growing problem of hunger would be addressed.
“Hunger is the world’s number one problem, with around a billion people facing hunger everyday...the woodgas multi-cab
survival implements are the solution to the food problem, since food production is very much tied to energy supply. Without machineries and expensive ways to operate farm machineries, man cannot support the present world population. An alternative energy source to fuel transport, farm operation, production of fertilizers, has to be secured,” Go described his project.
The woodgas multi-cab survival implements have become a “Swiss knife,” catering to all needs of farming with little cost.
Go has also decided to submit his invention to Google’s “Project 10 to the 100,” a contest that calls for ideas that “could change the world, in the hope of helping as many people as possible.”
Google hopes to empower people to help others in answering pressing issues in the world through solutions that they came up themselves.
