00:00:01.760 --> 00:00:03.840 Our society produces a lot of waste. 00:00:04.220 --> 00:00:06.170 Over 2 billion tons per year, in fact. 00:00:06.810 --> 00:00:10.820 A number that's expected to grow by 70 percent by 2050. 00:00:10.820 --> 00:00:15.130 That's a line of garbage trucks stretching from San Francisco to New York 00:00:15.130 --> 00:00:17.300 City every single day. 00:00:17.650 --> 00:00:21.640 Organic materials in landfills decompose. 00:00:21.640 --> 00:00:24.280 They produce methane, a very potent greenhouse gas. 00:00:24.600 --> 00:00:26.690 Solid waste, plastics, paper, cardboard. 00:00:26.940 --> 00:00:29.320 There's a lot of energy within those - carbon and hydrogen. 00:00:29.670 --> 00:00:32.260 Why don't you do something useful with it? 00:00:33.450 --> 00:00:36.020 Converting waste into energy is not a new idea. 00:00:36.580 --> 00:00:40.290 Usually, though, this has meant incineration - that is, burning our trash 00:00:40.290 --> 00:00:41.440 to recover some energy. 00:00:42.340 --> 00:00:43.810 But that has major drawbacks. 00:00:44.200 --> 00:00:47.810 Incineration creates toxic ash and hazardous chemicals called dioxins. 00:00:48.440 --> 00:00:51.560 And heat and electricity are pretty much the only usable outputs. 00:00:52.600 --> 00:00:56.410 A better solution may lie in gasification, an old technology which has 00:00:56.460 --> 00:00:59.320 only recently been repurposed as a way to deal with our waste. 00:01:00.500 --> 00:01:02.770 Gasification companies don't burn trash. 00:01:03.070 --> 00:01:06.450 Instead, they turn it into a gas, in a process that they say is both 00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:08.030 economical and eco-friendly. 00:01:09.010 --> 00:01:13.020 The focus is on producing a good quality syngas that can be converted into 00:01:13.050 --> 00:01:16.880 higher value energy products on the back end, be it electricity, hydrogen, 00:01:16.880 --> 00:01:19.480 diesel fuel, possibly even chemicals, fertilizer, etc., 00:01:19.480 --> 00:01:23.840 in the future. It's an exciting idea, and some major players, including 00:01:23.840 --> 00:01:26.900 the Bill Gates-led fund Breakthrough Energy Ventures, have thrown their 00:01:26.900 --> 00:01:31.290 weight behind it. While in the past, gasification companies have struggled 00:01:31.290 --> 00:01:35.250 to scale up and meet their energy production targets, now companies like 00:01:35.250 --> 00:01:39.000 Sierra Energy, Enerkem and Plasco say they're ready to commercialize and 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:45.090 expand. I think we have over 9,000 interested parties from around the 00:01:45.090 --> 00:01:47.020 world who've contacted us already. 00:01:47.660 --> 00:01:49.750 The question is how quickly can we get one? 00:01:50.110 --> 00:01:51.510 The answer is soon. 00:01:57.920 --> 00:02:01.320 The world's first municipal waste incinerator was built in 1874 in 00:02:02.100 --> 00:02:06.230 Nottingham, England, and like incinerators of today, it converted trash 00:02:06.280 --> 00:02:08.640 into ash, gas and heat via combustion. 00:02:09.400 --> 00:02:11.860 Initially, the purpose was just to shrink our waste. 00:02:12.710 --> 00:02:16.110 Eventually though, Great Britain and Germany did start recovering energy 00:02:16.110 --> 00:02:19.480 from the process. But the idea didn't really catch on i n the U.S. 00:02:20.130 --> 00:02:23.870 Domestic electricity prices were already low, and as emission standards 00:02:23.870 --> 00:02:27.220 tightened, incineration got even more expensive as compared to 00:02:27.260 --> 00:02:31.480 landfilling. It wasn't until the oil embargo and resulting energy crisis 00:02:32.250 --> 00:02:33.460 in the 1970s that the U.S. 00:02:33.460 --> 00:02:35.460 really took an interest in waste-to-energy tech. 00:02:36.290 --> 00:02:39.990 Over 100 waste-to-energy incineration plants were built, but when fuel 00:02:39.990 --> 00:02:42.000 prices dropped, interest waned. 00:02:42.720 --> 00:02:46.860 You see a lot of interest in this waste conversion or biomass conversion 00:02:47.370 --> 00:02:49.060 when the fuel price is really expensive. 00:02:50.430 --> 00:02:54.580 And then when the fuel price drops, nobody really cares. 00:02:55.840 --> 00:02:58.890 Today, there are about 70 waste-to-energy plants in the U.S., 00:02:59.010 --> 00:03:00.120 and the number is declining. 00:03:00.660 --> 00:03:04.570 But globally, many European countries still rely heavily on incineration. 00:03:05.060 --> 00:03:08.040 And Japan and China have been building waste-to-energy incinerators at a 00:03:08.040 --> 00:03:12.950 rapid clip. But many environmentalists say we need a better solution. 00:03:13.500 --> 00:03:17.150 Incinerators still emit harmful pollutants, especially in countries with 00:03:17.150 --> 00:03:18.940 lax environmental regulations. 00:03:19.640 --> 00:03:24.150 So burning waste to get rid of it may appear to be cheap, but the 00:03:24.150 --> 00:03:27.260 long-term health consequences for the community is terrible. 00:03:28.240 --> 00:03:31.600 So companies like Hart's Sierra Energy are looking towards gasification, 00:03:31.950 --> 00:03:35.230 an old technology that proponents hope to repurpose as a cleaner and more 00:03:35.230 --> 00:03:37.060 economical waste-to-energy solution. 00:03:38.170 --> 00:03:40.940 In the gasification process, materials aren't combusted. 00:03:41.330 --> 00:03:43.570 No toxic ash or dioxins are produced. 00:03:44.330 --> 00:03:47.700 Instead, a highly controlled amount of oxygen or steam reacts with the 00:03:47.700 --> 00:03:52.150 waste, turning it into a gaseous mixture of carbon monoxide, hydrogen and 00:03:52.150 --> 00:03:56.620 other elements. This synthetic gas has applications beyond electricity 00:03:56.620 --> 00:04:01.080 generation. It can be converted into high value products like diesel fuel, 00:04:01.080 --> 00:04:02.430 hydrogen fuel or ethanol. 00:04:03.270 --> 00:04:06.860 So even if electricity prices stay low, there'll be a market for these 00:04:06.860 --> 00:04:12.500 outputs. We seen much more value in chemicals and biofuels. 00:04:13.110 --> 00:04:16.720 Methanol is an important building block in the chemical industry. 00:04:17.030 --> 00:04:19.670 Ethanol is, of course as you know, can be blended and fuels. 00:04:20.170 --> 00:04:23.700 In this way, w aste-to-energy gasification plants have both upstream and 00:04:23.700 --> 00:04:25.090 downstream revenue potential. 00:04:25.700 --> 00:04:29.660 On one side, you're being paid to take garbage that normally would be 00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:31.120 dumped into a landfill. 00:04:31.560 --> 00:04:33.470 So that's one source of revenue. 00:04:34.060 --> 00:04:37.670 You then take that waste and you turn it into recycled products. 00:04:38.370 --> 00:04:40.270 Those products have very high value. 00:04:40.960 --> 00:04:44.910 And so from a business model perspective, you're getting paid on both 00:04:44.910 --> 00:04:49.900 ends. But a main challenge facing companies like Sierra Energy, Enerkem 00:04:49.900 --> 00:04:53.960 and Plasco is dealing with the unpredictability of using municipal solid 00:04:53.960 --> 00:04:58.560 waste as the fuel. Globally, there are hundreds of gasification plants 00:04:58.560 --> 00:05:02.340 that generate electricity from fossil fuels like coal, but waste-to-energy 00:05:02.340 --> 00:05:04.230 gasification is a whole different game. 00:05:05.050 --> 00:05:12.490 Tailoring your gasification when your fuel changes over time is the Holy 00:05:12.490 --> 00:05:16.970 Grail. And if they can consistently gasify and produce their natural gas 00:05:17.250 --> 00:05:21.380 from these waste materials, even if the content changes, that's an 00:05:21.380 --> 00:05:26.080 exciting option. Here are some of the main players taking that plunge. 00:05:30.380 --> 00:05:33.330 Davis, California based Sierra Energy was founded in 2004. 00:05:34.420 --> 00:05:39.120 Back then, CEO Mike Hart, who is also the CEO of Sierra Railroad Company, 00:05:39.460 --> 00:05:42.580 was seeking to improve the fuel efficiency of his locomotive fleet. 00:05:43.280 --> 00:05:46.400 We were trying to figure out a way to make our own fuel. 00:05:46.830 --> 00:05:49.120 We wanted to do something better than diesel. 00:05:49.900 --> 00:05:52.020 He was judging a business competition at U.C. 00:05:52.020 --> 00:05:55.690 Davis when he heard about how blast furnaces, one of mankind's oldest 00:05:55.690 --> 00:05:59.300 technologies, could be used to convert any mixture of materials into a 00:05:59.300 --> 00:06:00.720 usable synthetic gas. 00:06:01.620 --> 00:06:04.800 Hart bought the patents to this technology and Sierra Energy was born. 00:06:05.450 --> 00:06:09.060 Over time, its mission expanded far beyond its initial reach. 00:06:09.640 --> 00:06:13.220 People are realizing that climate change is a very real problem. 00:06:13.530 --> 00:06:19.530 When you throw away one ton of garbage, every ton is about 6.2 00:06:20.240 --> 00:06:25.610 tons of CO2 equivalent goes into the atmosphere in the form of methane. 00:06:25.900 --> 00:06:31.200 Methane is 86 times more potent a climate change gas than CO2 over a 20 00:06:31.200 --> 00:06:36.720 year period. Our technology provides one way of trying to address that 00:06:36.810 --> 00:06:41.740 problem. Last July, Sierra Energy closed its $33 million dollar Series A 00:06:41.740 --> 00:06:45.570 funding round, led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures, the Bill Gates led 00:06:45.570 --> 00:06:49.250 investor fund that also includes Marc Benioff, Jeff Bezos and Richard 00:06:49.250 --> 00:06:53.290 Branson. Now, the company has partnered with the Department of Defense to 00:06:53.290 --> 00:06:56.830 develop its first small-scale commercial facility at Fort Hunter Liggett 00:06:56.960 --> 00:06:58.420 in Monterey County, California. 00:06:59.280 --> 00:07:03.310 This demo facility can handle 20 tons of waste per day, and if all goes 00:07:03.310 --> 00:07:07.030 according to plan, it will begin processing trash in early 2020. 00:07:08.920 --> 00:07:12.220 Ultimately, Sierra Energy says what sets them apart is their use of the 00:07:12.220 --> 00:07:16.220 blast furnace, a centuries old technology in the iron and steel industry. 00:07:17.100 --> 00:07:18.130 Here's how it works. 00:07:19.270 --> 00:07:23.210 A blast furnace, which is the technology platform that Sierra Energy uses, 00:07:23.750 --> 00:07:25.320 is a high temperature vessel. 00:07:25.920 --> 00:07:27.370 Solid materials go in at the top. 00:07:27.640 --> 00:07:29.450 Injecting gases are placed in at the bottom. 00:07:29.710 --> 00:07:31.770 And you have a big countercurrent heat exchanger. 00:07:32.260 --> 00:07:35.000 We're injecting oxygen and steam at the base instead of hot air. 00:07:35.330 --> 00:07:38.850 And at the top, we're placing in solid waste materials instead of those 00:07:38.920 --> 00:07:40.350 mined materials from the ground. 00:07:40.720 --> 00:07:44.370 And instead of the focus being producing good quality metal out the 00:07:44.370 --> 00:07:48.580 bottom, our focus is on making a good qualit y syngas, synthesis gas, out 00:07:48.580 --> 00:07:53.170 the top of the vessel. Once the syngas is produced, the local community or 00:07:53.170 --> 00:07:54.940 developer will decide what to do with it. 00:07:55.610 --> 00:08:00.030 The company lists electricity, hydrogen, renewable diesel fuel and ammonia 00:08:00.130 --> 00:08:01.310 as likely end products. 00:08:01.960 --> 00:08:05.540 About 10 percent of the waste material can't be converted to gas and so is 00:08:05.540 --> 00:08:08.670 instead turned into a stone that can be used as construction material. 00:08:10.030 --> 00:08:13.510 Because of this wide variety of use cases, it's hard to say for sure 00:08:13.510 --> 00:08:16.090 exactly how clean the end-to-end process will be. 00:08:16.980 --> 00:08:19.170 It really depends on the specifics of the project. 00:08:19.170 --> 00:08:21.680 How far waste is having to be brought to the location. 00:08:21.940 --> 00:08:24.470 Some of the configuration of the plant itself. 00:08:25.630 --> 00:08:28.920 Hart is confident though, that in almost every case, it will be carbon 00:08:28.920 --> 00:08:32.900 negative. Because even if you're making electricity or diesel for a 00:08:32.900 --> 00:08:37.080 vehicle, the amount of pollution that comes out of the tailpipe or 00:08:37.270 --> 00:08:41.770 smokestack is less than the amount of emissions that you're offsetting in 00:08:41.770 --> 00:08:46.070 the first place. Furthermore, Sierra Energy's plant doesn't rely on 00:08:46.110 --> 00:08:47.380 external energy to operate. 00:08:48.160 --> 00:08:51.630 Instead, Hart says that about 20 percent of the energy created is used to 00:08:51.630 --> 00:08:52.670 run the plant itself. 00:08:53.240 --> 00:08:57.730 And so by some people's analysis, you can make this carbon negative or 00:08:57.960 --> 00:09:02.530 carbon neutral. By other analyses, y ou can't quite get there, but it's 00:09:02.530 --> 00:09:06.390 certainly cleaner than fossil natural gas. 00:09:06.920 --> 00:09:09.940 Over the next few years, Hart says the company plans to build out 00:09:09.940 --> 00:09:13.530 community-scale systems that can handle about 50 tons of waste per day, 00:09:14.190 --> 00:09:17.250 the equivalent of approximately 50,000 people's trash. 00:09:18.040 --> 00:09:21.390 If we want to have an impact on that 13.2 00:09:21.500 --> 00:09:25.980 billion tons a year of greenhouse gas, we need to have thousands of these 00:09:25.980 --> 00:09:28.150 systems around the world as quickly as possible. 00:09:28.630 --> 00:09:29.790 That's our goal as a company. 00:09:33.620 --> 00:09:36.280 While Sierra Energy's most recent funding round has put it in the 00:09:36.280 --> 00:09:39.390 spotlight, there are a number of other veterans in this space. 00:09:40.080 --> 00:09:43.820 Two of the biggest are Plasco Conversion Technologies, f ounded in 2005, 00:09:43.950 --> 00:09:46.060 and Enerkem, founded in 2000. 00:09:47.540 --> 00:09:51.260 Like Sierra Energy, both aim to turn municipal solid waste into valuable 00:09:51.260 --> 00:09:52.750 end products through gasification. 00:09:53.480 --> 00:09:57.270 But unlike Sierra Energy, these two companies have actually accumulated 00:09:57.270 --> 00:10:01.170 years of firsthand experience operating full-scale gasification plants, 00:10:01.550 --> 00:10:04.390 dealing with their fair share of delays and setbacks along the way. 00:10:06.010 --> 00:10:09.370 Plasco Conversion Technologies uses plasma to refine the waste from 00:10:09.370 --> 00:10:11.470 gasification into a clean syngas. 00:10:12.080 --> 00:10:15.590 The company operated a large demonstration facility in Ottawa from January 00:10:16.140 --> 00:10:21.260 2008 to January 2015, capable of accepting 135 tons of waste per day. 00:10:22.410 --> 00:10:25.930 Eventually, Plasco got approval to build a commercial scale plant, a nd 00:10:25.930 --> 00:10:29.880 though the company raised over $300 million dollars, it ultimately wasn't 00:10:29.880 --> 00:10:34.240 enough. The new plant was never built, t he demo facility shut down, and 00:10:34.240 --> 00:10:35.890 Ottowa severed ties with the company. 00:10:36.900 --> 00:10:40.630 But Plasco kept chugging along and reemerged with a new outlook on the 00:10:40.630 --> 00:10:42.150 market. We put in 1.2 00:10:42.680 --> 00:10:47.400 million man hours and a decade of work and $407 million dollars. 00:10:48.040 --> 00:10:50.320 We can tell you many ways that don't work. 00:10:50.580 --> 00:10:51.890 And what we do now does work. 00:10:53.010 --> 00:10:58.820 In the process, w e realized that the waste-to-electricity market, the 00:10:58.820 --> 00:11:00.620 waste-to- energy market was going away. 00:11:01.790 --> 00:11:05.520 Unable to compete with the low price of natural gas, Plasco now aims to 00:11:05.520 --> 00:11:09.140 produce synthetic fuels for use in internal combustion engines, which can 00:11:09.140 --> 00:11:11.130 power cars, planes and trains. 00:11:11.900 --> 00:11:15.550 The company no longer operates any plants, but it says there are a number 00:11:15.550 --> 00:11:16.700 of projects in the works. 00:11:17.350 --> 00:11:20.500 And for these future endeavors, Plasco has slimmed down its business 00:11:20.500 --> 00:11:24.090 model. We aren't doing build, own, operate, transfer anymore. 00:11:24.090 --> 00:11:27.630 We're doing selling the equipment and the technology. 00:11:28.090 --> 00:11:31.230 So we restricted what we did , so we weren't in competition with the 00:11:31.230 --> 00:11:33.020 entire world, but more in cooperation. 00:11:34.310 --> 00:11:37.300 Another player, Enerkem, developed the world's first commercial 00:11:37.300 --> 00:11:39.390 waste-to-biofuels facility of its kind. 00:11:39.960 --> 00:11:43.960 It's been operating in Edmonton, Canada since 2014 and is currently 00:11:43.960 --> 00:11:47.390 focusing on turning trash into ethanol biofuel and chemicals like 00:11:47.390 --> 00:11:53.770 methanol. It's a facility that can take up to 100,000 tons per year of 00:11:53.800 --> 00:11:57.020 waste, around 300 tons per day. 00:11:57.930 --> 00:12:02.730 So this type of size would represent a community of around half a million 00:12:02.730 --> 00:12:05.290 to 700,000 inhabitants. 00:12:06.100 --> 00:12:10.020 This plant uses a technology called a fluid ized bed gasifier, in which 00:12:10.020 --> 00:12:13.230 the trash is dropped into a bed of hot sand, oxygen and steam. 00:12:13.830 --> 00:12:17.040 The precise mixture causes the waste to heat up and turn immediately into 00:12:17.040 --> 00:12:21.670 gas. But Enerkem has also faced challenges as it's scaled up. 00:12:22.380 --> 00:12:25.300 The company initially predicted its first plant would operate at full 00:12:25.300 --> 00:12:28.330 capacity by 2012, but it still isn't there yet. 00:12:29.060 --> 00:12:32.610 The company won't reveal how close it is to full-scale operation, but 00:12:32.610 --> 00:12:36.140 Chornet says that despite the delays, he's glad that his company is taking 00:12:36.140 --> 00:12:39.680 the time to get it right. We're really proud that we did not skip any 00:12:39.680 --> 00:12:42.640 steps. However, this comes at a cost. 00:12:43.030 --> 00:12:47.120 So we have both a patient approach and a realistic approach for 00:12:47.120 --> 00:12:48.290 innovations of this scale. 00:12:48.850 --> 00:12:54.570 And also we have an enormous database as well as operation time at 00:12:54.620 --> 00:12:58.960 commercial level. So these three aspects really differentiate us. 00:13:00.250 --> 00:13:03.840 In its 20 year history, E nerkem has raised $616.5 00:13:03.980 --> 00:13:07.210 million dollars and now has plans to build additional facilities in the 00:13:07.210 --> 00:13:09.010 Netherlands, Spain, the U.K. 00:13:09.140 --> 00:13:13.380 and Canada. It's one of the most well-established companies in the space, 00:13:13.780 --> 00:13:17.230 but with just one commercial facility, there's still plenty of room for 00:13:17.230 --> 00:13:20.550 others to play catch up and learn from what's worked and what hasn't. 00:13:21.370 --> 00:13:23.710 Everyone likes to be in the race to be number two. 00:13:24.290 --> 00:13:28.120 The idea is the first plant, the pilot plant is more expensive, so you'd 00:13:28.120 --> 00:13:29.680 rather learn from somebody else. 00:13:30.360 --> 00:13:32.460 On this topic, I'm not at all worried. 00:13:32.740 --> 00:13:36.750 The first one at large-scale may have some kinks in it, but it's also 00:13:36.750 --> 00:13:40.720 likely to get some of the best subsidies and deals from the municipality. 00:13:44.390 --> 00:13:48.250 These potential subsidies, alongside other policy drivers, stand to play a 00:13:48.250 --> 00:13:51.220 major role in determining how quickly this tech spreads. 00:13:51.760 --> 00:13:57.790 So the future for gasifiers is, in my view, more tied to the economics of 00:13:57.830 --> 00:14:02.820 the climate change story, t he prices on carbon, the prohibitions on 00:14:02.840 --> 00:14:06.960 emitting any fossil fuels, than it is on the technology, which we've known 00:14:06.960 --> 00:14:11.570 about for a long time. Given current policies, such as California's Low 00:14:11.570 --> 00:14:15.440 Carbon Fuel Standard, S ierra Energy says it could build many more plants, 00:14:15.770 --> 00:14:17.840 but not on the scale that they'd like to see eventually. 00:14:18.600 --> 00:14:20.310 To get to hundreds is very feasible. 00:14:20.380 --> 00:14:24.800 But to get many thousands, that will need different regions of the world 00:14:24.800 --> 00:14:28.600 to step up and force people to divert waste from the landfill. 00:14:29.610 --> 00:14:32.790 This could look like higher landfilling fees, carbon credits, carbon 00:14:32.790 --> 00:14:35.460 taxes, emissions regulations or subsidies. 00:14:35.990 --> 00:14:39.470 Any and all would be a boon, s o long as these gasification companies can 00:14:39.470 --> 00:14:41.100 operate as cleanly as they claim. 00:14:42.000 --> 00:14:45.110 But as climate policies and priorities shift in tandem with election 00:14:45.110 --> 00:14:48.600 cycles, it can be hard for this tech to establish a strong foothold. 00:14:49.480 --> 00:14:53.050 Once we know, o kay, this is a policy that we're going to stick with for 00:14:53.260 --> 00:14:57.170 10 years, I think there will be a lot of confidence from these investors. 00:14:57.500 --> 00:15:00.800 But if you don't know what the policy is going to be in every two years or 00:15:00.800 --> 00:15:04.620 three years or four years, it's very difficult to make any decision. 00:15:05.610 --> 00:15:08.870 But as our landfills fill up and the world gets hotter, companies, 00:15:08.920 --> 00:15:12.410 investors and the public at large are realizing that we can't wait much 00:15:12.410 --> 00:15:14.300 longer to seek novel solutions. 00:15:14.890 --> 00:15:18.940 People who say, we'll recycle our way out of it using conventional means, 00:15:19.380 --> 00:15:20.650 those people are out of their minds. 00:15:21.020 --> 00:15:22.040 It's not happening. 00:15:22.310 --> 00:15:27.080 If we're gonna do anything to try to reduce climate change, those 13.2 00:15:27.360 --> 00:15:33.020 billion tons of CO2 equivalent going into the atmosphere from landfills is 00:15:33.020 --> 00:15:35.230 the very first place that we should try to address it.
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