Safety of Wood Gas [Gasification] storing wood gas.

[Kevin Chisholm]

Dear Harmon
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Harmon Seaver" <hseaver at gmail.com>
To: "Gasification" <GASIFICATION at listserv.repp.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2006 10:09 PM
Subject: Re: Safety of Wood Gas [Gasification] storing wood gas.


> On 6/15/06, Mark Ludlow <mark at ludlow.com> wrote:
>> If being odorless is a problem, a little methyl mercaptan addresses that.
>
>   Yes, at least on the commercial level, as I said -- the original
> poster seemed to be thinking on a more local level, where that might
> take a lot more effort to implement.

I presume I am the "original poster." :-) Of course, it was on the "local 
level." I don't recall there ever being any discussions on the Gasification 
List about "centrilized wood gasification for community distribution." At 
any rate, it should not be much of a problem to add mercaptan to a wood gas 
stream. However, even better than an odorant would be a CO detector. They 
are available on a widespread basis, at a relatively low cost.

At any rate, there seem to be two levels of safety:
1: The level of safety that would be appropriate for a competent 
Designer/Builder of a wood gas system.
2: The level of safety that would be appropriate for a typical Consumer with 
no particular qualifications or experience.

Given that there is more to the Gasification List than close coupled stoves, 
I would suggest that it would be helpful to active List Members if some 
Safety Guidelines were developed. Most Designer/Builders can spot the 
obvious hazards, and guard against them. What would be especially helpful 
would be comments, suggestions, and reports of experiences on "danger 
situations" that were not intuitively or inherently obvious.

Your helpful comments on advancing the safe use of wood gas would be 
appreciated.

Best wishes,

Kevin

>
>
> -- 
> Harmon Seaver
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