L. John Fry: Methane Gas Guru

Image Gallery

Article Tools

Image Gallery

Print

E-mail

Comments

RSS

There lives in Santa Barbara, California a most interesting man. Because long before most of us even suspected that organic waste could be recycled into both high-quality fertilizer and a very low-pollution fuel, this fellow was experimenting with the idea. And long before many of us were even close to solving scum and pH and other anaerobic digester problems, this inventive cuss had singlehandedly and successfully figured out how to turn a very awkward mountain of pig manure into a most handy plant food and more than enough methane to drive a diesel engine day and night for a solid six years.

This unheralded genius is L. John Fry and his improved design for anaerobic digesters may someday be as famous as James Watt's steam engine. In the meantime we can personally vouch for the fact that L. John Fry is a genuine storehouse of information on the subject of recycling plant and animal waste directly into fertilizer and methane gas (a valuable skill indeed in these days of developing food and fuel shortages). He's also an all-round Good Guy who is most eager to transmit his knowledge to others ... as Cass Wester found out when she interviewed Mr. Fry in Santa Barbara.

PLOWBOY: Mr. Fry, how did you begin your involvement with methane production?

FRY: Well, I'm from Great Britain actually, and I was a pilot during the Second World War. After that I went to live in South Africa and was there a total of seventeen years. During that time I built up a farm from scratch.

PLOWBOY: This was your pig farm?

FRY: Yes. It took about five years to make the operation begin to pay. Then, when the enterprise started to become financially stable and I thought all my troubles were over, I found we had quite a problem on our hands ... and that problem was getting rid of manure. We had two tons-wet weight-a day to dispose of and, at that time, there was no official system" of using the material.

I tried composting the waste from our hogs and found that it involved an enormous amount of work ... four days labor a week. Then, as soon as we'd finished composting the manure, we had to put it out on the land ... spread it and dig it in. The wole thing became a very big do.

Along about that time I heard of experiments being done with methane digestion, but it was with chicken droppings and I didn't know if it would work with pig manure. So I went around to the local sewage works and talked to the engineers there and they said they thought it might work, but they weren't at all sure and that I'd have to bring them a specimen and they'd try it out.

PLOWBOY: Did you?

FRY: No, I just went ahead and tried it on my own. I built what we call a sump digester ... just a 55-gallon drum with a smaller drum turned upside down inside it. It was most effective and from that I made a whole range of calculations for, first of all, a medium-sized methane plant and, finally, a full-scale digester that would process all the manure on the farm.

RSS | Comments | E-mail | Print