The Green Evolution Transforming Leftovers into Energy and Fertilizer

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Gather 'round, eco-enthusiasts! Sheila here, your guide through the journey of imperfect sustainability. On this Earth Day special, we're not just preaching the green gospel; we're living it with hands-on action and innovation. From the sands of AJ Polonis Park where we, alongside 20 amazing volunteers, collected 42 bags of trash, to the cutting-edge realm of Home Biogas, we're taking you behind the scenes of real change. Tune in to hear how a community banded together for a cleaner future and learn about the system that could convert your leftovers into a home-cooked meal without burning fossil fuels.

Ever wondered if those banana peels could do more for the world than just decompose? Listen closely as I break down the nuts and bolts of the Home Biogas system - Tampa's latest green initiative. We're talking about the potential to use organic waste to cook up a storm, and the bonus of liquid fertilizer that your garden will thank you for. Whether you're a seasoned eco-warrior or a newbie to the sustainable lifestyle, this episode is your chance to explore how small-scale renewable energy could revolutionize our daily lives. Join me as I share first-hand experiences, concerns, and the excitement of embarking on this new eco-adventure.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, lovely listeners, and welcome to Zero
Waste Imperfectly.
I'm your host, sheila, and I amthe owner of Life Essentials
Refillery.
Today is Earth Day, so happyEarth Day, everybody.
This morning we started off ourday by going and doing a beach
cleanup through Keep Tampa BayBeautiful.
It was AJ Polonis Park and wespent about two hours out there
and we picked up about 42 bagsof garbage, some shopping carts,

(00:23):
a lot of clothing.
It was a big cleanup, it wasnice.
Some a lot of clothing it was abig cleanup, it was nice.
Some 20 volunteers came out.
It was a beautiful day.
But today, since Earth Day, Iwant to talk to you about
something that we just gotapproved for through the city of
Tampa and it's called HomeBiogas and I had never heard
about it.
Someone had posted about itdown next door and it is this
contraption.
It looks like a giant blacktriangle inflatable thing.

(00:47):
I don't even know what you'dcall it.
It's not the prettiest thing,but what it does is really cool.
So my dad used to work for acompany that made generators
that were at the landfill andthey would use the methane.
They would landfills, createmethane gas and then they would
convert this methane gas intoelectricity and sell it back to
the grid.
So this is kind of a miniversion of that.
So, with this giant contraption, the bottom is going to be

(01:08):
filled with water and then, whenyou jumpstart, all the activity
that's going to create themethane gas is, you put a
natural fertilizer in there,like cow poop or something like
that.
There's all kinds ofdescriptions online but you put
that in there and it starts thischain of activities that make
your container, your home biogas, become active, and then the
top of the triangle startsslowly filling with gas.

(01:29):
And so, throughout the courseof using this contraption, you
would put all your food and youryard waste into it, and you can
put animal waste into it.
Home biogas even has a toiletthat you can add to it if you
want to.
We are not quite there yet, but, yes, you can put human waste
in there too.
And so what it does while itbreaks everything down, it
creates this gas, and the homebiogas is going to ship with a

(01:51):
stove, a gas stove.
So what you're going to do isyou're going to put your waste
in, it's going to produce gas,and then you're going to hook a
gas line to this little stove.
So we're supposed to put in thesame amount as whatever waste

(02:13):
you're putting in there that day.
You add the same amount ofwater to it, so obviously it's
going to overflow at some point,and so that overflow is a
liquid fertilizer and you canuse it.
You have to dilute and then youcan put it in your garden or
you can hook up a dripirrigation line to it so it
automatically goes into yourgarden.
But it's super cool, andsomething I highly encourage you
to check out is homebiogascom.

(02:34):
So just to run a quick runthrough you put your food in.
It creates methane, which is anatural gas, and then you cook
with it.
It methane, which is a naturalgas, and then you cook with it.
It's super easy.
So if you have used a systemlike this, I would love to hear
from you, because I am I've gotto say I'm a little bit nervous
about setting the whole thing up, because it is rather large and
you have to put it in yourbackyard and we're in the city
of Tampa, so it's not like wehave acreage to put it somewhere

(02:58):
.
It's going to be close to thehouse.
They say it doesn't stink.
So I'm excited to try it out,excited to hear what other
people have learned from it andwhat they loved and didn't love
about it.
I would love to hear it all soyou can find us at all platforms
at Life Essentials Refillery.
Thanks for tuning in and have agreat day and happy Earth Day.