Energy from table scraps
(March 2008)
UC Davis engineering professor Ruihong Zhang sees a vast untapped resource in yard clippings, restaurant and household table scraps and other biodegradable materials: enough methane and hydrogen to power the trucks that collect the waste from our curbsides, or to keep the lights burning in thousands of California homes.
In this program, Zhang explains how her new $4 million Biogas Energy Project is testing that idea on the UC Davis campus.
Appearing with her is one of the university’s project partners from the private sector, Dave Konwinski, CEO of Onsite Power Systems Inc.
Konwinski has worked for several years with Zhang to commercialize her research results. He intends to sell power-production facilities to waste-generating businesses, such as food processors, farms and dairies, and municipal green-waste collection programs.
Related news
- “New Technology Turns Food Leftovers Into Electricity, Vehicle Fuels,” UC Davis News Service press release, 10.24.06
- “Biogas,” NewsWatch UC Davis video, 2006
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Ruihong Zhang, professor of bioenvironmental engineering
Ruihong Zhang is a professor of biological and agricultural engineering who focuses on organic-waste management and air-quality control. The organic wastes include food scraps, agricultural and food processing by-products, animal manure, lawn trimmings and more.
She hopes to prevent environmental pollution and to convert these materials into valuable products, such as biofuels and biochemicals.
In the Biogas Energy Project, she is trying to find the right mix of biological agents (such as bacteria and enzymes) and physical conditions (such as temperature and oxygen levels) to convert waste into biofuels (methane, hydrogen, ethanol and biodiesel). This process is called an advanced anaerobic digestion system, or anaerobic digester.
Zhang also is developing a commercial-scale anaerobic mixed biofilm reactor for liquid waste treatment. And she is trying to optimize waste management programs to reduce gas emissions (methane, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and volatile organic compounds) from animal feeding operations, such as dairy farms.
Contact: Ruihong Zhang, UC Davis Biological and Agricultural Engineering, (530) 754-9530,
Dave Konwinski, CEO of Onsite Power Systems Inc.
Dave Konwinski is chief executive officer of Onsite Power Systems Inc. and directs the firm’s marketing and business development programs.
Konwinski has worked for several years with Zhang to commercialize her research results. He intends to sell power-production facilities to waste-generating businesses, such as food processors, farms and dairies, and municipal green-waste collection programs.
Onsite would design the biogas plant to fit the customer's operations and then build it on the customer’s property. The customer’s waste stream would be processed in the plant, yielding energy that could be used to power the customer’s mechanical operations or even its vehicles.
Onsite Power Systems has invested more than $2 million in helping Zhang refine the technology and prepare it for transfer to the commercial market.
The other major funding source for Zhang's ongoing research has been the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) program, which has awarded the university grants of nearly $1 million.
Contact: Dave Konwinski, Onsite Power Systems Inc., (559) 270-5760,