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Onions make you cry, add flavor to food and are touted for their medicinal benefits. Now the vegetable has another use — powering up green energy.
洋蔥可以刺激得人流淚,可以在烹制食物時作為調(diào)料增加香味,而且它還有醫(yī)學(xué)價值。現(xiàn)在，這種蔬菜又有了另外一項功能——發(fā)電。
A new system debuts that converts onion juice into electricity at Gills Onions, the largest fresh onion processor in the United States.
美國最大的洋蔥加工商Gills Onions推出了一個新的發(fā)電系統(tǒng)，可以將洋蔥汁 轉(zhuǎn)換為電能。
據(jù)悉，這種用洋蔥發(fā)電的新系統(tǒng)有望每年為該公司節(jié)省70萬美元的電費,還可 為公司減少高達3萬噸的溫室氣體排放。
The Oxnard, California — based company expects its new onion — fueled power to reduce its electric bill by $700,000 a year and cut its annual greenhouse1 gas emlssims2 by up to 30,000 tons.
不得不說，既經(jīng)濟，又環(huán)保，這個綠色能源的故事結(jié)局很圓滿。但是誰能想到， 這一想法最初卻源于如何處理洋蔥廢料這個令人頭痛的問題。
The happy ending to this green energy tale, however, started with another question: how to get rid of onion waste.
史蒂文?吉爾，這家已創(chuàng)立25年之久的公司的合伙人說:“當(dāng)我們要食用一個洋 蔥時，我們首先要去掉它的頭、尾，以及剝離外表的皮層，這樣我們才能得到洋蔥的 果肉;而在此期間洋蔥已產(chǎn)生了 35% ~ 40%的廢料。
“When we peel an onion, 35 to 40 percent of the onion comes off before we have a usable onion. That’s the top, tail and skin around the onion before you get to the meat,” said Steven Gill, co-owner of the 25-year-old company.
他們通常是把這些廢料拉到野外作為肥料，但是這也是個問題。10年前，吉爾 就開始嘗試利用科技來解決這一問題,這當(dāng)中就包括微型燃氣輪機的設(shè)ih
They used to haul the waste to the fields for compostion, but that became a problem. Ten years ago, Gill started looking at technology for a solution, including microturbines.
“We ended up shredding4 the skins as they come out of the plant and extracting all the juice, which is very high in sugars, and bacteria love that stuff，，， Gill said.
“當(dāng)洋蔥皮被剝離之后，我們就將其粉碎,然后在其中提取汁液。但這種洋蔥汁 含糖量極高，很容易滋生細菌?！凹獱柂{。
In the new system, bacteria produce methane5 gas from the juice. The gas then goes to two 300 kilowatt fuel cells, creating enough power for 460 homes. The company expects to get 35 to 40 percent of its electricity from the on-site generator.
而在新系統(tǒng)中，這些細菌可以通過洋蔥汁產(chǎn)生甲烷，然后這些氣體通過兩塊 300千瓦的燃料電池，其產(chǎn)生的電量足夠460戶居民的日常用電。該綠色發(fā)電系統(tǒng)有 望承擔(dān)該公司35% ~ 40%的用電量。
