The number 2 solution video transcript
Start of transcript
(Music playing)
Narrator
Sorry to interrupt but I have to break something to you this isn't a cooking show this is a story about what happens after the cooking show ends. It doesn't matter if it's a chocolate fudge dessert or delicious roast chicken. Regardless of where you are, your number two looks exactly the same as mine. Everything you flush rinse and wash down the drain all goes to the same place.
Text on screen
The number 2 solution
Narrator
The story of number two's begins at the end, at a place we all know of but don't like to think about. It's the end of the line for your number two’s along with everything else that gets flushed down the pipes. To the wastewater treatment here at Logan City Council, it’s a little different. They can turn your waist into something special, these small black lumps are a little different to the charcoal you get after your barbecue because this stuff is called biochar. Biochar could be the answer to the problem you didn't even know existed and here to help us care a little bit more about our number two's is Joe Johnson.
Joe Johnson
This treatment plant's been here since around the 1970’s and it deals with sewage from all of Logan, so about 300,000 people.
Narrator
That's a lot of poo Joe.
Joe Johnson
Yeah, exactly, so the biosolids that we have originally were 34,000 tonnes of very wet sticky material really not that great to be able to pump or do anything with. It's just not fun.
Narrator
And this wet sticky sludge is hiding a problem, something very deep inside, something that we need to get rid of. Here to help us understand is Agricultural Scientist Pael Sinner.
Peel Sinner
Everything that we are consuming which is, you know, one time use, we are throwing away. These are all plastics that either end up in landfill or, scary part is, if we are consuming something that is in it, it's ending up in us. It is everywhere, it is in our food you know how we love to put our food in the microwave like easy to go meals.
Narrator
So every time we heat up plastic or freeze it, it breaks off thousands of microplastics that go into our food. And on this cute baby spoon?
Pael Sinner
Yes that contains microplastics.
Narrator
Exactly how much plastic are we eating
Joe Johnson
We're consuming about a credit card a month in Plastics.
Narrator
Is there anything else we have to be worried about.
Joe Johnson
Yes, Flor alcohol substances, full on fluorines, it doesn't break down in the environment it's a really that kind of forever chemical. It is getting banned from being used in things but it's like fire retardance, nonstick frying pans, microwave popcorn. It's a useful chemical it's just not great for us.
Narrator
Now that we know how bad all this stuff is that we just flushed away without thinking, what do we actually do with the biosolids before biochar.
Joe Johnson
Biosolid was a waste, it was something that we had to pay someone to dispose of. Previously 36 trucks were going up to the daring downs , six trucks per day six days a week.
Narrator
So Joe how much does Logan City Council actually pay for our sludgy poop to be taken away.
Joe Johnson
So, at the time when we were doing the planning report it was about $1.8 million per year.
Narrator
$1.8 million a year that's enough to make anyone clench their butt cheeks.
Joe Johnson
And that’s risen to around 2.4 to nearly 3 million.
Narrator
What Joe, please tell me that's a joke so I can stop clenching
Joe Johnson
When biosolids are trucked out to the darling downs or anywhere for a land application. It was a traditional process that put nutrients back into the soil however with things like sludge mization which is the release of carbon dioxide and methane back into the atmosphere it's not a great thing on the carbon scale. If we went our traditional route it's about 160,000 tons per annum of carbon into the atmosphere.
Narrator
Let me do some quick math. Yep it's just as I thought that's a lot of carbon Joe.
Joe Johnson
Other point of it is that ways treatment plants capture everything, like, it's not like we can say no you cannot put that rinse aid down the sink or any of those types of things. We are going to get it, so when you apply biolsolids to land you are applying these trace elements that come through and then they build up. Those really, really, small plastics, they do end up back in the soil.
Narrator
So after discussing the dangers of microplastics, the pitfalls of p-fas and the drawbacks of biosolids we've arrived at the part of the story where our main character has to spill the beans tell us your secrets Joe how do you make biochar.
Joe Johnson
To get to biochar we have to dry it. Firstly, it goes to what we call the dewatering state, so the same sort of thing as what you see with a washing machine. It then goes to the drying stage which is the same as an oven it's just on a belt. It uses the renewable heat energy taken from the gas to dry those biosolids to be 90% dry. It then goes to the gasifier which is a half and that heat set up to about 650°. Tthe Biosolids would drop in from the top hit the first plate and it spins slowly like a clock and once it hits the bottom it will be a carbonized product. So you're basically removing off all the gases and those gases then go to the oxidizer to be treated and that gas is what we use for the renewable energy. What's left is just that solid stream and that carbon material making a biochar.
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Pael Sinner
Okay so now that we have this material which is charred at such a high degree, yes it does not have microplastics because it gets destroyed, doesn't have pfas and again a lot of it is destroyed. It becomes a material which can help in huge microbial growth, increased pH, has high water holding capacity. All of which is really important in agriculture.
Narrator
So farmers will like it.
Joe Johnson
Biochar is made up of about 52% carbon which is sequestered carbon, and that's fixed, so it's locked in it doesn't move out into the environment.
Narrator
Farmers, the environmentalists and the corporate ladder climbers will like that too.
Joe Johnson
Biochar which is of value can then be used in all these other different ways. Is it going to be activated carbon it is going to be used in so and remediation, there's so much value and potential here. It's now actually something that is a product of value and going back into the economy.
Narrator
And that will make Joe, Pel and this Majestic Pelican and the whole planet a happier place. Okay panic attack avoided so not only can I stop clenching for the sake of the planet you should too. Who would have thought that the diet cheating mistakes of today could become the planet Saving Solutions of Tomorrow. Joe and her team at the Logan City Council have achieved what many thought impossible, a safe biochar product made entirely from human waste but with some earth size bonuses.
Joe Johnson
I love working in in this type of environment and doing something actively about climate change. I do hope that this is the Catalyst for not only having a gasification facilities in Australia but throughout the world,because what it's doing is solving an age problem that we have that drives me to keep on doing these types of projects. What's cool though is we're not shy about saying there's this cool project that we're doing, you can do it too with Pel and the other scientists.
Narrator
Deep into the testing and research of biochar it could soon be used in more Industries than we ever could imagine and hopefully gasification plants like this one can soon be turning your number two's into the black gold that we actually want. Because in the not too distant future part of the answer to the world's greatest threat could be that we make the number two solution our number one priority.
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