Decomposition- An alternate heat source?

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

Originally Posted by Zephyr

But didn't society also just realize that using carbon tetrafluoride can give you cancer?

Everything gives us cancer. cancer cells are produced in your body every day, it's all in how efficient your body is at disposing of them. A cancer cell is just a messed up cell that decides it would like to make more of it's kind as fast as possible. it's just that we are exposed to so many un natural things today that our bodies are much more prone to slipping up in defenses and allowing cancerous cells to multiply.

Much of society also had no idea until recently that they were being unknowingly mass medicated with fluoride.

I mean, go for it, I don't completely doubt your efforts, but i don't think that it will be an efficient way to heat our reptiles. If you do manage to roduce enough heat in such a small space, how will you control it?

[Stefan-A]

There is a way to use a compost to heat a terrarium. You create anaerobic conditions, which leads to a rotting process instead of decomposition and you could collect the methane and burn it to heat up your tank.

Or, you could draw a water pipe through the center of the compost (with a few coils in there to add surface area and exposure time) to transfer the heat from the compost to the water and then lead it back indoors to the terrarium.

I don't think it's worth the trouble.


Other stuff about composts:

The heat is a problem, a compost can reach temperatures of about 70 degrees Celsius at best, but most organisms that break down organic matter are dead by about 45. Likewise, their activity slows down as it gets cooler. The heat energy escapes into the environment, that's why the surface is colder than the core of a compost. And I'm afraid it does need volume to work. Otherwise it will be too cold to decompose efficiently.

One thing that would be interesting, though, would be a worm compost, but it would be more of a feeding than a heating solution. That one doesn't need volume, you can have one in a 10 liter bucket if you want to. Unfortunately, the worms usually used indoors, are Eisenia. The toxic kind, if you remember.

[drache]

I dumped some nightcrawlers in my compost and contrary to what I'd heard, they did not make off in search for better compost - apparently they like our diet and are sticking around to work on the refuse

I think that providing an appropriate temp gradient in a small space is hard enough
even if you get a small process going which might be hard, but perhaps not impossible, it's gonna be a long time to get it to stable heat

I think it's a very interesting long-term project
I guess you'd need some insulating medium to make up for piles of plant matter

btw
there is an article in the current "Reason" magazine by Brian Doherty, titled "Power from the People", that might interest you
I was looking, but it's not on their web-site yet
it's about making machines that essentially run on certain kinds on garbage and are carbon neutral