Grass clippings from around campus are generating biofuel to power a number of buildings – thanks to the innovation and ingenuity of PhD candidate Nikolai Holder. His discovery is a direct result of his research interest in anaerobic digestion technology, which uses micro-organisms to biochemically convert organic matter into biofuel or methane, popularly known as natural gas.
Grass, ten types of which were analysed, proved to have the most potential of all the bio-organic substrates, as well as sargassum seaweed, fish offal, coconut husks,
river tamarind and sugarcane bagasse.
To conduct his analysis of the biochemical methane potential of the substrates, Holder constructed a semi-industrialised anaerobic digester system in February 2018.
“I expanded on the system that I had initially, and I started feeding it some of the grass clippings from around campus. I used it to produce biogas. I compressed it (into) biomethane and I’m using it to power six research labs, the biology prep room and a teaching lab. In October, we ran the lab off the compressed bio-methane then in November we switched over almost completely, though there’s a propane canister there as backup. So far, it’s working perfectly,” he said.
“This ties in with the Smart Campus initiative. A lot of it has to do with reducing our carbon footprint, the use of green technology, clean power generation and reduction in the waste output. This does exactly that. What we’re looking to do is (create) a methane-potential map of the island. So, this study is looking at testing the yield of methane gas per unit acre. Once we can do that we can then apply that to the island and determine that if different types of grass grow in a certain spot they would yield (a certain amount). This has nothing to do with harvest time or how long it takes to grow. That would be for future research.”
Holder, who presented his findings during last November’s Student Research Symposium during a session centred on
Innovation & Ingenuity: Implications for Industry: Biofuels & Climate, is considering expanding this energy supply to other laboratories, canteens and kiosks
. Three other Cave Hill students have investigated renewable energy solutions as alternatives bearing in mind the heavy reliance on fossil fuel by Barbados and other regional states.
The Effects of Weather and Dust on Photovoltaic Performance in Barbados is being researched by Darlene Field, a doctoral student, who has conducted similar weather-based PV performance studies in Jamaica.
In her Barbados research, she set up four modules (PV panels) and compiled data from 2015-2016 on matters such as planar radiance, ambient temperature and the concentration of dust in the atmosphere.
The three polycrystalline silicon modules and one monocrystalline silicon module were cleaned after a month of exposure to determine how cleaning affects them in terms of dust build up.
In an hourly comparison of data, the researcher noted an increase in power and irradiance between 10-12 a.m. daily, much as she had anticipated. However, while the power for each module varied, the monocrystalline module showed a decrease in power leading her to conclude that this module is more temperature sensitive than the other. Field also did a comparison of the average power output for all the modules and matched that to the dust concentration that they obtained.
In examining the power output the day before and after cleaning the module, she said there was no significant change in the power output for the monocrystalline module, which was attributed to its temperature sensitive nature. However, the remaining modules had an average of two percent increase in the power output after cleaning following a month of exposure.
“We realise that if you increase irradiance you increase power, which we knew. If you increase the temperature, however, you decrease the power output which is the performance. We also noticed that monocrystalline is more temperature sensitive than polycrystalline. We also realised that the maximum power output that we get is 50 percent. We realise that the power output is best between the springtime months of March and June and at that particular point the temperature is not the highest and the irradiance, especially, is not the highest. There is a point of 40 degrees Celsius where the temperature becomes more dominant. The power output relates linearly with the dust concentration and the power actually increases by about two percent after cleaning after one month of exposure,” she concluded.
Research conducted by recent graduate Dr. Jamila Jones focused primarily on the production of biofuels and biochemicals from sugarcane bagasse.
Utilising bagasse samples from Portvale Sugar Factory, she isolated 26 bacterial strains, four of which yielded positive results, or, were positive in glucose and xylose sugars and produced aromatic compounds.
“We were also able to demonstrate how the bagasse could be used as a substrate, which we can convert to sugars that we can use for bio-fuel production as well as converting the lignin component to give us different types of platform compounds. These are typically compounds that you can use to make other high-value materials. We were also able to demonstrate how this work could perform in a low-energy and environmentally-friendly manner,” explained Dr Jones, who graduated with a Doctor of Philosophy in Chemistry.
Meteorology post-graduate student at the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology and the University of the West Indies Adanna Robertson-Quimby is seeking to provide a better understanding of the effects of climate variables on the electric load in Barbados.
Bearing in mind the climate-sensitive nature of Caribbean economies, her study aims to develop modeling framework for the region to compensate for climate change and variability impacts on the electric load in tropical climates like ours.
She accessed data from the Barbados Light & Power (BL&P) spanning 1981- 2010 to produce her statistical model and found that between May-October, there was greater demand for energy from BL&P. She cautioned that this may become a challenge if the climate continues its current trajectory.
Overall, she said, the warmer climate is affecting electricity consumption, with increases in energy loads based on the temperature. She indicated she would conduct further examination of the data, to include weekday and weekend holiday effects, among other matters. Though Robertson-Quimby used Barbados as a case study, she hopes to have her investigation replicated across the Caribbean.
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