Turning wood into electricity for 2 months of the winter

Eric Hanson wrote:David B,

I hope you don’t misunderstand my earlier post.  Very true, surface carbon can be recycled.  My only concern would be that if does get recycled and that a person takes the added effort to deliberately recycle that carbon by replacing trees that were removed.  Atmospheric carbon can be recycled through plants, and it does not matter if that CO2 came from coal, natural gas or wood.  What does matter is that people take individual responsibility to actively recycle that carbon by planting (ideally) fast growing trees of some type.

Again, I hope you don’t misunderstand my post (and from the sound of your other posts, I think you get the thrust of my point),  I am merely pointing out that it is incumbent upon us to go out of our way to turn atmospheric carbon Back into wood.  For example,  I would not support clear cutting forests to produce electricity.  This is a pretty drastic example, but I make it just to be clear that done uncontrollably, even burning wood can have a detrimental effect if we don’t actually recycle that wood.

Thanks for all the detailed information.

Eric

All good Eric, I just wanted to be clear. And yes there simply is not enough biomass to support business as usual. Massive energy usage reduction would be required to make it work.

Eric Hanson wrote:The BEST option that we have as individuals though is to conserve the electricity that we use.

I've been an electrician for 40 years and even though we can have absolutely anything electrical we want, we chose the simple practical frugal minimalist approach you described.

Through adapting to living simply our electric bill averages $44 per month all year round even though we pay 19 cents per kWh and our sewage treatment plant runs 12 hours a day. We conserve with all LED lighting, propane cook stove, hot water, and clothes drying. No air conditioner, no central heating, no huge refrigerator, no freezer, no microwave, no dishwasher, no trash compactor, no garbage disposal. Our air conditioning is fans, and our heat is a wood stove.

During the last wildfire we had no electricity for a couple of days and no phone or internet for a week and we were just fine. This disaster practice run provided valueable real world experience in learning how to do without.

We make a game out of it.

300kwhr per month is pretty good.
I use about 100kwhr of electricity per month. But if I were to calculate my space heating+cooking+hotwater+transportation+laundry drying+plastic fork production. I am sure it would be ridiculously huge.

David B,

No problem.  I pretty much assumed you and I were thinking along the same lines, I just wanted to be clear myself.  Thanks for the response though.

Eric

Frank Li,

I am not completely certain that an all electric house is indeed the most carbon sensitive house available.  My specific thoughts regard electric ovens, stove tops and heating.  Assuming that the electricity is coming from coal (an assumption, but a fairly safe one), Then the coal at the power plant must be burned to produce heat to boil water, to drive a turbine (now we are already at about 35-40% efficient right here) to drive a dynamo (more losses) to transmit over power lines (still more power losses) to eventually be turned back to heat again.  I am thinking that the final heat in a residential home is a pittance the heat originally produced at the power plant.  Would it not be better to simply burn the same fuel  (for apples to apples comparison, but propane or natural gas would be much better) IN the house and produce heat with NO added transformation steps and associated energy losses?  This should produce heat with nearly 100% efficiency (a pittance of energy is lost in the form of visible light we see, a trifle more is lost in the form of heating the metal surroundings of the firebox itself).  When I built my home I dearly wanted to put in a wood-burning fireplace.  Economics and practicality meant that a propane gas fireplace won out.  Our model is a vent-less model, meaning that all of the exhaust gasses stay within the house.  It is considered to have an efficiency rating of over 99%.  I asked why it was not 100% since all of the heat was kept in the house and I was told that the metal insert absorbed a tiny amount of energy.

These are just my thoughts and maybe I am wrong.  I assumed we were using coal and if one is using wind, solar, hydro, nuclear (another discussion for another day--some love nuclear and have good facts to support them, others hate nuclear for good reason.  Again not going there this time, just saying that this is a source for around 20% of the electrical production in the US), then the carbon emissions issue might well be different.

Once again, these are just my own thoughts and if you see any problem with them, then please, lets discuss.

Eric

Good points Frank!  The math on this is definitely not down to $/KWH.  I don't know anything about "grid zero" so I'll have to look into that.  My hunch is that they'd charge the same interconnection fee they do now but you never know.

I do have a decent source of wood.  10 acres of my own and much more around if I just look/ask.  Especially pin.  Plus pallet wood or municipal wood chips.  Collecting 4 cords to heat the house and 2 more to provide back up electricity woudn't be that daunting.  

S., are your numbers based on actual wood gas results?  I'm tempted to trust the numbers from GEK quoted above since they seem to be based on a fair bit of experience.  

While the talk about grid energy sources vs home sources and carbon from deep vs carbon from trees is interesting, it could lead to taking this thread a bit off topic.  

Mike,

Sorry if I strayed from the topic.  Once I start talking about energy, it is hard for me to stop.  I did a little bit of research into the GEK as well.  In my opinion, this is the best, most efficient, best built/most reliable wood gassifier out there.  Some of their generators are also very interesting.  I know they have (or at least had) one setup which achieved a high-90s efficiency because they captured waste heat from their motor & coolant for their burn chamber.  Their units are not cheap, but I think they are sturdy, well built and might suit the needs of someone like yourself.  If you had the money to pony up, this might be a very sound investment.

Eric

No problem Eric, we're all having fun here.  I'll have to dig into the GEK wiki site a bit deeper.  I only saw their power pallet design the first time through.  Now I see they have kits you can assemble.  There goes another hour this evening

I use 2 kW per lb of wood as the heat energy it contains if dried to 20 percent moisture. You should do your research of course but Wayne runs his truck on a 40-60 lb hopper of wood in 40-50 mile trips so my numbers hold up. I run my tractor on 12-14 lbs of charcoal per hour and running on gasoline that same tractor doing the same work burns 1 gallon of gasoline... APL is another good resource for you. Driveonwood has a better pool of actual DIY builders.

Is any of that 10kwh/day used for heating air, water,  mass, cooking? Possibly the need for some of this portion of the electricity could be designed out by collecting the heat directly?


Probably excessively complex, but propane fridges/freezers are really just running off of heat. They're less efficient than compressor units in electrical terms, but maybe not less efficient than converting a heat source to electricity and then running a compressor system?

10kWh of electricity = 15Hp of shaft power = 1gal of gasoline (33kwh) = 20lbs of biomass through a gasifier.
http://wiki.gekgasifier.com/w/page/6123680/Biomass%20to%20Woodgas%20to%20BTU%20to%20HP%20to%20KW%20to%20MPG%20conversion%20rules

Mike you are right, the numbers quoted already factored in the 33% efficiency of the engine.
I am not too sure what the efficiency is for the gasification process, and that is assuming that the wood is at 12% moisture content after being dried in a kiln or something. So we would have to factoring in that process too.

After a bit of searching
1kg of biomass = 20MJ = 5.5kWH
10kg of biomass = 22lbs of biomass = 200MJ = 55kWH
Gasification turns that into the equivalent of 1gall of gasoline = 33kWH
So a 60% efficiency, which seems pretty good.

S Bengi wrote:300kwhr per month is pretty good.
I use about 100kwhr of electricity per month. But if I were to calculate my space heating+cooking+hotwater+transportation+laundry drying+plastic fork production. I am sure it would be ridiculously huge.

We average 230 kWh a month. 30 kWh of that goes for waste water treatment so our household use is 200. It's fun being frugal. (lol)

S Bengi wrote:10kWh of electricity = 15Hp of shaft power = 1gal of gasoline (33kwh) = 20lbs of biomass through a gasifier.
http://wiki.gekgasifier.com/w/page/6123680/Biomass%20to%20Woodgas%20to%20BTU%20to%20HP%20to%20KW%20to%20MPG%20conversion%20rules

Mike you are right, the numbers quoted already factored in the 33% efficiency of the engine.
I am not too sure what the efficiency is for the gasification process, and that is assuming that the wood is at 12% moisture content after being dried in a kiln or something. So we would have to factoring in that process too.

After a bit of searching
1kg of biomass = 20MJ = 5.5kWH
10kg of biomass = 22lbs of biomass = 200MJ = 55kWH
Gasification turns that into the equivalent of 1gall of gasoline = 33kWH
So a 60% efficiency, which seems pretty good.

yes those numbers are more in line with the reality on the ground as i've experienced it. Probably not quite that good unless you are recycling most of your waste heat for material drying as you go.  The reference you quoted first the 20lbs per gallon is the most commonly used one. Safer to use 2Hp per kW Hr of electricity taking into account battery chargers efficiency, battery throughput and idling... maybe charging up the start battery for the fans used at light up. PS that is a great reference page for conversions. It helps with the tricky math required to juggle it all.
Cheers,  David

David B, do you have a thread on your tractor?  That would be neat to read more about!  Your actual experience is most appreciated

How is the charcoal gasifier easier to make than a wood fired one?  Is the gas cleaner or more reliable as well?

Dillon, plenty of my current electricity is for heat or cooling.  Tank style electric water heater, electric teapot kettle, electric toaster oven, fridge, freezer.  The water heater was chosen for the ability to do solar hot water some day with the electric element as a backup.  The kettle and toaster oven are in the place of a microwave and to avoid firing up the natural gas oven.

Thanks S for backing the GEK numbers!

Can these systems run unattended?  Would doing so in a greenhouse risk burning it to the ground?  This is part of why I'd want to buy a kit or finished unit.  What would I have to do with the generator exhaust?  I'm assuming it would have to be routed outside, maybe after going through a radiator to heat the room

Lots of folks increase the CO2 levels in greenhouse. So I think that leaving the CO2 in the greenhouse is okay.
Maybe from 10-2 during peak plant CO2 usuage/sunlight.
As long as the Oxygen levels in the room isn't doing in the single digit from 20% I don't think that there should be much problems.
If it does a ERV ventilation system could be used, and it will bring in fresh air to the greenhouse but minimized heat loss.

With a 20lbs hopper/feeder the the entire process should be hands off.
I would do a full check before I start it up.
And some type of auto-shutoff once the hopper is empty sounds like a good idea.

Mike,

The GEK is supposed to be walk-away safe.  Obviously, since the gasification process produces carbon monoxide which is then burned, you would want this in a highly ventilated/outdoor area, but it is set up with a little computer controller and should run for a long time all on its own.  It is a pretty slick setup.

Eric

If I remember correctly the 10kWh GEK unit cost $20,000.  But I am not too sure if they still sell it.
The 20kW GEK unit cost $1.5/w so $30,000. http://www.allpowerlabs.com/products/20kw-power-pallets

You might be able to buy just the gasifier kit for $2,000. Then and engine, then a generator. And also add a hopper/etc and also some type of circuitry to make it all work and bring the cost down by alot.

Mike Jay wrote:David B, do you have a thread on your tractor?  That would be neat to read more about!  Your actual experience is most appreciated

How is the charcoal gasifier easier to make than a wood fired one?  Is the gas cleaner or more reliable as well?

Dillon, plenty of my current electricity is for heat or cooling.  Tank style electric water heater, electric teapot kettle, electric toaster oven, fridge, freezer.  The water heater was chosen for the ability to do solar hot water some day with the electric element as a backup.  The kettle and toaster oven are in the place of a microwave and to avoid firing up the natural gas oven.

Thanks S for backing the GEK numbers!

Can these systems run unattended?  Would doing so in a greenhouse risk burning it to the ground?  This is part of why I'd want to buy a kit or finished unit.  What would I have to do with the generator exhaust?  I'm assuming it would have to be routed outside, maybe after going through a radiator to heat the room

here is the link to my charcoal tractor thread:
http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/my-charcoal-tractor/1200
here is a blog post I did linking to some videos
https://smallhomesteadonabigplanet.com/
I don't touch a thing once I set up my air adjustment so yes You can leave it untended to run. That is charcoals charm the ease of construction and simplicity of the unit. If you heat with wood its worth looking into. Think of it as splitting the gasification process into two parts. Burn down the wood for heat in a stove in the greenhouse then use the cooled and graded coals to do work. If you don't need the heat that's different the extra fuel use is then a waste.
there are a lot of charcoal generators in the small engines section of drive on wood.

I do heat the house with wood so I could make char that way.  I like the idea of splitting the chemical process into two parts.  And your way of making coals is more productive than mine.  Inside the wood stove I use a small steam table pan with a lid to cook the gasses out of wood scraps.  So I can do a small batch at a time.  Your way looks much more productive.  

Mike Jay wrote:I do heat the house with wood so I could make char that way.  I like the idea of splitting the chemical process into two parts.  And your way of making coals is more productive than mine.  Inside the wood stove I use a small steam table pan with a lid to cook the gasses out of wood scraps.  So I can do a small batch at a time.  Your way looks much more productive.  

I saw a video of that method. Do you have a link? It's a good method except it wears out the containers although stainless maybe not as much. It's also better if you want to make great char using low value wood as the heat source. I tried some in a chimney section in the stove for a while but as mentioned it was too slow. When I'm making char I empty out the ash and after light up I'll only burn maple for best results so it's hard on the hardwood reserves.  Also my way you have to sift out ash. You get no brands of unchared material though which are a no no for charcoal gasifiers.

Here's the video I worked from.  I have a 1/4 size 6" deep steam pan that fits off to the side in my stove.


Good point that if I'm charring pallet wood, your method probably won't work well.  My good firewood is birch, the majority is softer stuff.

Mike Jay wrote:Here's the video I worked from.  I have a 1/4 size 6" deep steam pan that fits off to the side in my stove.

Good point that if I'm charring pallet wood, your method probably won't work well.  My good firewood is birch, the majority is softer stuff.

there is a user who generates power in Australia using nothing but hardwood pallet char... hundreds of hours per year. Hes on the small engines section...

Mike Jay wrote:Here's the video I worked from.  I have a 1/4 size 6" deep steam pan that fits off to the side in my stove.

Good point that if I'm charring pallet wood, your method probably won't work well.  My good firewood is birch, the majority is softer stuff.

Nice video I like the point about stacking. I try to do that as well. In this one I'm refining carbons, boiling beans, drying laundry and humidifying the house... In spring time in the greenhouse I try to make char, boil maple sap, add humidity to the beds and heat my starts... Its getting there slowly. Never enough time as I'm sure you know.

David Baillie wrote:Think of it as splitting the gasification process into two parts. Burn down the wood for heat in a stove in the greenhouse then use the cooled and graded coals to do work.

That is a perspective I have not viewed pryolysis from.  Thank you.

I was noodlin on distilling water with the waste heat.  I have a large set of NiFe cells and they are thirsty.   But now I'm thinking griddles, ovens, maybe even kiln's.

I thought that it was possible to run an Imbert design off of either wood or charcoal.   Opinions?

I am most following Flash's footsteps.  He uses materials I can get here.  In his last offering he open-sourced the full automation plans.  

The All Power folks are the wizards.  No doubt about that, but in my opinion they suffer from the same illness as most of academia.  "Over Com-bob-ulation".  In perfecting the process they made the device un-achievable by the common person.

Simple is robust.

Mike Jay wrote:
The problem is that I live in an area that is pretty cloudy in the early winter (mid Nov to mid Jan).  

Mike, just adding this data to the discussion.  The array noted here is probably at about the same latitude as your location.  The picture below is a rolling tally across last year of production from a 4.2kW array....a demo operated by a local power coop.  The site describing the demo is here:  https://www.rrvcoop.com/energy-mix  .   From that page, find the line "You can view real-time production by clicking on Solar Demo."  where the words 'Solar Demo' are hot-linked.  Just in case this provides some real-world data in a similar climate for your calculations.

Hi John, data will be important.  I also have a number of trees that can't realistically be cut so I might have a bit of shading as well.  I'll have to get a full analysis by my solar installer guy.  Luckily he's in the same area and is off grid himself.

I have experience with both on and off grid solar applications my on grid home with a 1600 square foot mobile home with all the basic things that a normal house would have like an electric dryer furnace so on and so forth I had 18 panels on my roof and that paid almost my entire bill my gas and electric bill we're tied together and in the summer my bill would be like 30 40 bucks in the winter however it would be higher as it was mostly gas

However I also share your problem with off-grid solar it is very cloudy where I'm at now you can still do it with solar you'd be surprised how much power you can get even from very low light crappie conditions on a cloudy day my six solar panels can still bring in a couple hundred watts an hour  there are several ways of achieving this but first and foremost you have to be much more conscious about how much power you use in your home you'd be surprised how much it can be reduced doing simple things like switching to LED lights getting rid of your electric powered dryer switching to a gas stove get a on demand gas powered water heater that will help with a gas bill quite a bit and make sure all of your TVs are LCD is the use considerably less power that being said you can still use solar in Cloudy conditions you simply need more panels and a bit more clever usage of solar controllers so you do not overcharge your battery when the sun does come out also if if the conditions are right where you live wind small-scale wind generators are a great help as well I'm on a hill and I can get a 500 watt 48 volt windmill for 240 bucks on Amazon

What kind of budget are you working with because an off-grid battery by itself you looking at 5 to $10,000 to power a conventional home mine's a custom-made 5 kilowatt with built-in inverter and solar controller and Bluetooth it's lithium and it was 7500 before shipping

Mark Cunningham wrote:

David Baillie wrote:Think of it as splitting the gasification process into two parts. Burn down the wood for heat in a stove in the greenhouse then use the cooled and graded coals to do work.

That is a perspective I have not viewed pryolysis from.  Thank you.

I was noodlin on distilling water with the waste heat.  I have a large set of NiFe cells and they are thirsty.   But now I'm thinking griddles, ovens, maybe even kiln's.

I thought that it was possible to run an Imbert design off of either wood or charcoal.   Opinions?

I am most following Flash's footsteps.  He uses materials I can get here.  In his last offering he open-sourced the full automation plans.  

The All Power folks are the wizards.  No doubt about that, but in my opinion they suffer from the same illness as most of academia.  "Over Com-bob-ulation".  In perfecting the process they made the device un-achievable by the common person.

Simple is robust.

the simple answer is yes you can run an imbert off of charcoal only... but don't. Without that good balance of humidity and complex hydrocarbons from the wood above it your machine will overheat. You would have to go with stainless nozzles maybe refractive etc... You would loose the simplicity inherent in charcoal gasification while having the limitations of charcoal... Worst of both worlds. Flash's unit looks nice I did not watch it all but its probably an imbert as is APL and most home builders. Wayne Keith uses his own modified design discussed at length on the premium side and in my opinion its a superior design to the imbert units. APL started as all DIY but they are focused on their power pallets now. Driveonwood is focused on DIY with some commercial guys as well. If you peruse things you will notice a definite line in the sand. The more south you go the more likely they will use raw wood gasifiers as you go north into the wood heating regions charcoal starts to dominate. That is exactly as it worked out in Europe during the second world war as well. Sweden, Norway charcoal france Wood, Germany in the middle.

David Baillie wrote:premium side and in my opinion its a superior design to the imbert units.

I am on DOW.  I've been debating the membership.  

David Baillie wrote:If you peruse things you will notice a definite line in the sand. The more south you go the more likely they will use raw wood gasifiers as you go north into the wood heating regions charcoal starts to dominate. That is exactly as it worked out in Europe during the second world war as well. Sweden, Norway charcoal france Wood, Germany in the middle.

That is an interesting evolution.  I wonder where the equatorial tropics would fit?  High heat / humidity and soft woods.   There's a fella in Thailand producing charcoal reactors.  Van Looken.

Hi Ryan, I don't think my wind is reliable enough here due to plenty of white pines and I'm not on a hill.  I haven't pieced together a budget yet and this is a few years out.  Hopefully everything gets cheaper by then

Mark Cunningham wrote:

David Baillie wrote:premium side and in my opinion its a superior design to the imbert units.

I am on DOW.  I've been debating the membership.  

David Baillie wrote:If you peruse things you will notice a definite line in the sand. The more south you go the more likely they will use raw wood gasifiers as you go north into the wood heating regions charcoal starts to dominate. That is exactly as it worked out in Europe during the second world war as well. Sweden, Norway charcoal france Wood, Germany in the middle.

That is an interesting evolution.  I wonder where the equatorial tropics would fit?  High heat / humidity and soft woods.   There's a fella in Thailand producing charcoal reactors.  Van Looken.

Yes Koen's stuff is nice. I would say he is an outlier. He is or was experimenting with raw wood units as well. His work is focused was focused on simple to implement rural solutions. Recently he is linked to a university. He could explain it far better. I think the premium is worth it I have it.and I'm cheap. Not worth it if you are only interested in charcoal gasification as its mostly about the wayne keith builds and improvements Lots of talented fabricators and very helpful.

Maybe cheap, green,  or energy intensive,  pick two, should be the saying.
If you don't use refrigerating,washing,drying, traveling,communication,pumping,cooking,lighting or heating devices, you could easily have all three.
I'm not ready for that myself.

Propane has been described as  off grid's dirty secret.
It can do anything grid tied electric can do, aside from net metering.
It's freeing,  but hardly green.
Set aside the air pollution,and just think about the fracking.
Wood burning in its various forms  might be a greener choice,and even less entangled with the rest of the world.
Better still, wood is often considered waste, all the more reason to use it.

The refining of wood into charcoal for use in IC engines seems worth doing since it allows for a simpler gasifire to be used.
Charcoal has so many uses, and it is evidently easier to store.

On the subject of making charcoal,  heating the feedstock in a closed container and redirecting the combustible gasses to fuel the reaction has advantages.

Woodchips should work fine in such an arrangement.
The process produces heat over a drawn out time period,and the heat that isn't used right away can be stored in water for later use.

The fires that are used to start such a reaction tend to be inefficient and require tending.

Batch rockets burn for about 45 minutes, no matter what the size.
A properly sized retort/batch box combination could ensure the feedstock  produced combustion gasses with the BTU's  available in that first 45 minutes, allowing the process to be self sustaining from that point.

This could result in a burn that is really long and still rather clean, with charcoal as the end product.

Affected as I am by the RMH mantra "metal is doomed! "
I noticed the last time I visited the driving on wood forums that most gasification rigs seemed to use metal, only turning to ceramic for things like nozzles.
I wonder if that is still the case.

My nightdreams* last night were about a batch box mass heater (or masonry heater like my buddy has) that has a 55 gallon drum sized firebox.  On each side on the inside goes a metal curved container for the wood chips.  The main fire and firewood goes in the middle.  The fire gets the chips cooking and their gasses escape through a few holes to add to the fire.  Most of the heat stays in the mass.  The next day I pull out the two containers and get 20 gallons of charcoal.  Reload, refire and make another batch.

Then the charcoal chips go in a gasifier that is outside somewhere (so I don't burn down the greenhouse, house or garage).  That feeds a generator in an acoustically insulated shed.

It would be delightful if the system could be sized so that I'd only need 60 charcoal fires a winter and 30 gasifier burns during the two month cloudy season.

At some point this may have turned more into a dream than reality...


* like a daydream but they happen while you're attempting to sleep

Eric Hanson wrote:Frank Li,

I am not completely certain that an all electric house is indeed the most carbon sensitive house available.  My specific thoughts regard electric ovens, stove tops and heating.  Assuming that the electricity is coming from coal (an assumption, but a fairly safe one), Then the coal at the power plant must be burned to produce heat to boil water, to drive a turbine (now we are already at about 35-40% efficient right here) to drive a dynamo (more losses) to transmit over power lines (still more power losses) to eventually be turned back to heat again.  I am thinking that the final heat in a residential home is a pittance the heat originally produced at the power plant.  Would it not be better to simply burn the same fuel  (for apples to apples comparison, but propane or natural gas would be much better) IN the house and produce heat with NO added transformation steps and associated energy losses?  This should produce heat with nearly 100% efficiency (a pittance of energy is lost in the form of visible light we see, a trifle more is lost in the form of heating the metal surroundings of the firebox itself).  When I built my home I dearly wanted to put in a wood-burning fireplace.  Economics and practicality meant that a propane gas fireplace won out.  Our model is a vent-less model, meaning that all of the exhaust gasses stay within the house.  It is considered to have an efficiency rating of over 99%.  I asked why it was not 100% since all of the heat was kept in the house and I was told that the metal insert absorbed a tiny amount of energy.

These are just my thoughts and maybe I am wrong.  I assumed we were using coal and if one is using wind, solar, hydro, nuclear (another discussion for another day--some love nuclear and have good facts to support them, others hate nuclear for good reason.  Again not going there this time, just saying that this is a source for around 20% of the electrical production in the US), then the carbon emissions issue might well be different.

Once again, these are just my own thoughts and if you see any problem with them, then please, lets discuss.

Eric

 the word i used was 'streamlined'. I live off grid in a rural area..... with a utility line on the house but not in it, so i do shorten the loop a bit. Sun and wood for home energy demands here!

Frank,

I stand corrected.  I misunderstood your statement.  My apologies if I offended.

Eric

Very interesting thread!

I remember having heard about a camping stove that can charge cell phones so I went and did some googling and I found it
wood stove USB charging

This is not a solution to all your electricity needs! But it could be an emergency solution with which you could make sure you could always at least keep your cell phone charged, maybe even your laptop and a few USB-chargeable LED lights as well?

Mike Jay wrote:
At some point this may have turned more into a dream than reality...


* like a daydream but they happen while you're attempting to sleep

So here is one of my personal favourites. He drives a car on charcoal has a walipini type greenhouse with cold cellar attached and heats a garden bed while making charcoal. He is in slovenia. Puts my efforts to shame but everyone needs someone to emulate right?

His greenhouse thread
http://forum.driveonwood.com/t/wood-gas-heated-greenhouse/3203

A walk around video:

Wow, that's quite the set-up!  At first the root cellar looked like a small scoop that he was going to toss stuff down into.  I pooped my pants when he climbed down into the catacombs.  That's awesome!

I think my char burner would probably not be buried but I'd still want to surround it with plenty of mass.