Synthetic oil from waste and garbage. Five useful inventions made from waste. Gasoline from garbage at home: expert opinion

As you know, polymer waste is a new “natural” disaster. Plastic bags have become the bane of our existence. They pollute waterways, become entangled in the branches of trees and bushes, and decay over hundreds of years into smaller particles. The fact is that plastic takes a very long time to decompose, accumulating on the surface of the earth and in the waters of the ocean. Every year America uses 380 million plastic bags, and only on average 7% of them are damaged. recycling. Security Department environment The United States provided disappointing data, according to which over 3 million tons of waste were generated in this state in 2008 alone. Only 13.6% of them were recycled. “Frightening” forecasts were published by the consulting company Petro Strategies, whose experts came to the conclusion that the world’s oil reserves will last until 2057, and gas until 2064.

Such disappointing forecasts and an increase in the volume of unrecycled plastic waste make it possible to assert that soon there will be no natural resources left on Earth that are used in the production of plastics, especially hydrocarbon-based ones. It is from this type of plastic that housings for electronic devices are made. Note that oil can be obtained not only from electronic waste, but from any plastic that meets the necessary criteria. Thus, most types of plastics used for electronics are made from hydrocarbons. First of all, we're talking about about ABS plastic, polycarbonate and polypropylene. However, PVC and some other plastics do not contain hydrocarbons, which means that they cannot be converted into oil.

In Japan, there are very few places where you can take your garbage, just like in the rest of the world. But we can turn an everyday product into a source of fuel and reduce the accumulation of plastic bags.

A machine that recycles plastic bags into fuel, plastic, back into oil, was invented in Japan. The creator of this stunning and, importantly, compact device is Akinori Ito from Blest Corporation. The advantage of his small machine is that the items do not need to be shredded.

Ito's inspiration came from the simple understanding that plastic is made from petroleum, so turning it back into petroleum shouldn't be very difficult. The highly efficient, environmentally friendly machine can process polyethylene, polystyrene and polypropylene, but not PET bottles.

Plastic recycling occurs as follows: you need to load unnecessary plastic (bags, bottles, etc.) into the machine. It must be said that before loading, plastic waste must be cleaned of dirt and food debris.

When heated in an electric heater, the plastic is converted into gas, which is then cooled in a water radiator. The plastic waste in the installation is heated, the vapors released during the process are sent to a special pipe system, where they settle, cool and condense into crude oil. Crude oil can be used for heating generators and furnaces or refined into gasoline.

Akinori Ito: “You’re just pawning plastic bags and the boxes inside as you have them. Then it is easier to understand that they turn into oil. I turn on the unit... the temperature will begin to rise. The plastic begins to melt and turn into liquid. After the liquid boils, gas will begin to flow through the tube into the water. This is tap water, it cools the gas and turns the gas into oil. Oil can simply burn. But you can also continue the refining process and get gasoline, diesel and kerosene. You can use the resulting oil to operate a car or motorcycle, or a generator, boiler, or stove. You can use it just like regular oil. If you burn 1 kg of plastic, it will turn into 3 kg of carbon dioxide. Using my method, you can get about 1 liter of oil from 1 kg of plastic.”

Discussions about global warming have been going on since 2000. When loading 1 kg of plastic into a miracle machine, the output will be 1 liter of petroleum product, while spending 1 kW electrical energy, but without harmful CO 2 emissions into the atmosphere.

When Akinori Ito first created this recycling process in the summer of 2010, he explained that by converting plastic into oil, CO2 pollution was eliminated: “In Japan, we use oil that comes to us from afar - from Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia. It is refined at an oil refinery and transported by tanker. And we buy it at gas stations. CO 2 emissions are very high. If plastic waste were turned back into oil, our total emissions into the atmosphere would be much lower. If the whole world started doing this, the amount of carbon dioxide would be reduced significantly. Using electricity and heat, we can turn it back into oil and reduce CO2 emissions by about 80%. Even in developed countries Garbage is thrown away by people who are indifferent to the environment. In developing countries, even if they care, they don't know how... So I bring this unit and teach them. This is the only unit that can be transported by plane. We bring it to Africa, the Philippines or the Marshall Islands. And together with local children we collect garbage and make oil. People are starting to realize that this is not garbage. These plastic waste, bottle caps, lunch boxes are oil. Therefore, when the child understands this, the garbage disappears. People don't know that garbage is oil. So they throw it away. If they find out that it turns into oil, then they will collect it. It's an oil field, a plastic oil field."

Although the final product of plastic processing is fuel, which will then be burned releasing CO 2, innovative method recycling has revolutionized the way plastics are processed. Household materials are suitable for this system. Thus, it greatly contributes to creating energy independence among consumers and reducing the need to extract more oil from the ground.
The device, invented by Akinori Ito, is available in various modifications, both for industrial and home use.

Refining plastics into oil is already used in industry. So, not far from Washington there is a large enterprise that this moment is testing a similar process.

Processing plastics into oil in households makes it possible to use the resulting “black gold” as fuel for certain types of electric generators and furnaces.

Professor Georgy Lisichkin, head of the laboratory of organic catalysis of the Department of Petroleum Chemistry and Organic Catalysis of the Faculty of Chemistry of Moscow State University, does not share Akinori Ito’s optimism regarding the use of the device at home. Mr. Lisichkin notes that there are no electricity generators for cottages that run on oil. And the processing of plastics into “black gold” requires quite large quantity plastic waste. According to the professor, such a device is much more justified not in households, but in industrial enterprises.

Ekaterina Borisova

Vladimir Khomutko

Reading time: 4 minutes

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How to dispose of oil refining waste?

Solid waste from oil refining enterprises of the oil refining industry is of various types chemical substances(adsorbents) that cannot be regenerated, ash and other solid oil residues that are formed as a result of heat treatment of wastewater, as well as various kinds of sediment, tarry substances and dust collected during the cleaning of emissions. The most in a simple way The disposal of such waste (if it does not harm the environment) is to burn it in furnaces.

The ash and slag remaining after heat treatment are in some cases used as fillers in the manufacture building materials, in more in rare cases– as fertilizers, very rarely – as a raw material for the production of certain petroleum components. If slag and ash are unsuitable for reuse, they are sent for storage to special dumps, where solid non-flammable oil refining residues that are unsuitable for further use.

At oil refining and petrochemical enterprises, one of the main types solid waste are the so-called acid tars.

They are formed as a result of sulfuric acid purification processes to which some petroleum products (oils, paraffin, kerosene-gas oil fractions, and so on) are subjected. Also, tars remain after the production of additives, synthetic detergents and photoreagents.

Acid tars are resinous masses with high viscosity, characterized by various degrees of mobility. They mainly consist of water, sulfuric acid and various kinds of organic substances, the content of which can range from 10 to 93 percent.

The volumes of remaining acid tars are quite large - within 300 thousand tons per year. Since the percentage of their use is less than 25%, this leads to the accumulation of significant quantities of them in factory barns (storage ponds).

According to the concentration of basic substances in them, acid tars are divided into:

• tars with a high acid content (from 50 percent monohydrate or more);
• tars with a high concentration of organic substances (50% or more).

Their possible use depends on the chemical composition of such waste. They can be processed to produce ammonium sulfate, used as fuel (immediately or after purification from acid) or as a reagent used in the purification of petroleum products.

However widespread implementation the above processes are hampered by:

• high degree of complexity of the technology for producing ammonium sulfate from acid tars;
• limited market for its sales;
• large material and labor costs for the purification of liquid waste and gases released as a result of the use of tars as reagents or as fuel.

The technology for processing acid tars to produce bitumen, high-sulfur cokes, sulfur dioxide and some other substances looks more promising.

For example, in the process of processing these wastes into sulfur dioxide for further production of sulfuric acid, liquid solutions of sulfuric acid, which are waste waste, are usually added to them. The mixture obtained in this way is much easier to transport and is also quite easy to spray with nozzles. The process of thermal splitting of such an acid-tar mixture occurs in furnaces at temperatures from 800 to 1200 degrees Celsius.

With such temperature conditions organic components burn completely, producing sulfur dioxide. Abroad, this principle is used in a number of installations producing 98 - 99 percent sulfuric acid or oleum, with a capacity of 700 to 850 tons per day. There are such installations in Russia.

The organic part of acid tars contains various types of sulfur compounds, resinous substances, solid asphaltenes, as well as carboids, carbenes and other components. This makes it possible to process them into bitumen, which is widely used as road-building materials.

When these oil residues are heated, the sulfo compounds and sulfuric acid they contain are split, which oxidize organic substances and compact the tar mass, resulting in the formation of a heterogeneous mixture in which a large amount of carboids is concentrated. To obtain such a bitumen mass during processing, acid tars are mixed with straight-run tars, which remain after distillation of oil and fuel fractions from crude oil. In such a mixture, the compaction reaction that produces asphaltenes and resins is less profound because the concentration of free radicals and oxidant is reduced.

The fact that acid tars easily decompose at temperatures from 160 to 350 degrees, forming sulfur dioxide and coke with a high sulfur content, is widely used to obtain the listed products in industrial scale.

The most common are low-temperature installations in which acid tars decompose on a coke coolant. At these installations, solutions of spent sulfuric acid are also decomposed, first mixing them with highly organic tars or oil residues with a high content of organic substances.

Petroleum coke with high sulfur content is used in some technological processes at non-ferrous metallurgy enterprises as a sulfiding and reducing agent, as well as in some technical processes of chemical industry enterprises (for example, in the production of Na 2 S and CS 2), as well as for other purposes.

Serious difficulties associated with the disposal of acid tars have led to the emergence of separate non-waste principles at oil refining enterprises.

For example, the following modern methods for purifying petroleum products are being introduced everywhere:

Oil sludge

Solid impurities contained in processed raw materials and auxiliary materials, as well as some other substances, form oil sludge at oil refineries and petrochemical plants.

From one ton of crude oil during its refining, the yield of sludge is approximately 7 kilograms. Considering the huge volumes of processed raw materials, huge amounts of such waste accumulate in the earthen barns of such enterprises, which is a serious problem.

Oil sludge is heavy oil residues with an average content of 10 to 56 percent oil products, 30 to 85 percent water and 1.3 to 46 percent solid impurities.

During storage in barns, separation of these wastes occurs, resulting in the formation of:

1. top layer consisting of aqueous oil and petroleum product emulsion;
2. middle layer (water contaminated with suspended particles and oil products);
3. the bottom layer, in which three quarters is a wet solid phase impregnated with petroleum products.

Oil sludge can be used in several ways.

For example, if such waste is dehydrated and subsequently dried, it becomes possible to return it to production for subsequent processing into target products. It is also possible to use them as fuel, but this is too expensive from an economic point of view.

If oil sludge is used to produce flammable gas, then water, evenly distributed in oil products and closely associated with them, acts as an active chemical medium, since during the heat treatment of sludge it interacts with fuel more effectively than the steam usually used in such technological processes.

In addition, the presence of water greatly reduces soot formation. However, the use of sludge to produce flammable gases on an industrial scale is a very costly process, which prevents its widespread use.

By adding quicklime to such waste (from 5 to 50%), after drying the resulting mixture under natural conditions for 2 to 20 days, it can be used as a filler or as a bedding during the leveling process building surface, since this material is very slightly susceptible to leaching.

Instructions

For the production of gasoline, first of all, containers. First of all, it is a metal barrel with a tight-fitting lid. A heat-resistant tube must be connected to the lid. You will use this vessel as a retort. Any container is suitable for the condenser, and a durable vessel with two tubes is suitable for the water seal. One of the tubes will have to be located, and the second - on the surface.

Assemble a device for producing liquid hydrocarbons. Connect the pipe coming out of the retort lid. Insert the hose. Connect its other end to the water seal tube, which will be located under. Connect the second valve tube to the stove, and place the retort on the stove. You will have a closed system for high temperature (pyrolysis).

Load the retort with rubber waste and close the lid. Heat contents over high heat. Under the influence high temperature disintegration occurs. The bonds between molecules are broken. This is followed by sublimation of the separated molecules. They enter the condenser, where the temperature is significantly lower. Accordingly, vapors begin to accumulate there and then condense. The substance turns into a liquid aggregate state, this is artificial oil.

During the pyrolysis process, not only liquid hydrocarbons are formed, but also a mixture of gases. That is why the system must be closed. Most of the gas is methane, which passes through all elements of the device and eventually enters the furnace. There it burns magnificently, helping to maintain desired temperature and not waste extra fuel.

What is in your capacitor is not yet. To turn the contents of the condenser into fuel, you need a distiller - like the one used in moonshine stills. There should be no open fire. In this case, an electric stove is preferable. The boiling point is not very high, maximum 200°C, but can be significantly lower. It all depends on the quality of the waste from which it is made " synthetic oil».

Video on the topic

note

There is no point in producing gasoline in a city apartment. You need a room that is well ventilated. During pyrolysis, sulfur oxides are released. In addition, the process is accompanied by heavy smoke.

Helpful advice

It is impossible to obtain high-quality gasoline without additives. This gasoline has a low octane number, so it cannot be used in all internal combustion engines.

When traveling to unfamiliar places, when a motorist is forced to refuel the car at unknown gas stations, it is very likely that low-quality fuel with a low octane number will enter the fuel tank.

You will need

• - fuel additive – 1 bottle

Instructions

Theoretically, if you refuel with low-quality gasoline, then all the fuel must be immediately drained from the tank without any residue. And then fill up with high-octane gasoline and continue the trip. But in practice, it is very rare to put theory into practice. Consequently, the motorist is forced to the limit of his nervous system continue the trip, exposing unjustifiable risks, disturbing the ecology of the environment.

When you get to the nearest auto store, purchase a bottle of an additive that will turn low-octane fuel into high-octane fuel. In addition, after adding the additive to the fuel tank, the throttle response of the engine will increase, and emissions harmful substances into the atmosphere will decrease by an order of magnitude. By spending a little money, you can turn your trip from onerous to enjoyable.

Video on the topic

note

The fuel additive is added at the rate of 150 ml per 50 liters of gasoline.

Once installed chemical composition water, people try to answer the question: “How to get gas from water?” After all, hydrogen is a flammable gas that can serve as an alternative fuel. Today you can get it, even in small quantities, even at home. To do this, you can use the electrolysis method.

You will need

• - graphite and iron electrode;
• - direct current source;
• - lithium, sodium or any other alkali metal;
• - caustic soda;
• - water;
• - test tube.

Instructions

Pour some caustic soda into a clean tank or container and add water. Caustic soda (sodium) significantly improves the electrical conductivity of water. Stir the resulting solution until the soda is completely dissolved.

Find a reliable DC power source. To obtain gas from water into simple generator, battery or galvanic cell. Connect it to the electrodes so that the “plus” is on the metal rod (this will be the anode), and the “minus” is on the metal rod (cathode).

To get gas from water, turn on D.C.. Hydrogen will be released into the space around the cathode, and oxygen will be formed in the anode section. Cover the cathode with an inverted test tube or any container to collect the hydrogen.

It is possible to obtain gas, in particular hydrogen, from water in a simpler way. Pour into a small container, preferably a test tube, clean water. Throw in a small piece of lithium, sodium or any other alkali metal. It is almost impossible to get sodium at home. Lithium can be taken from lithium batteries, such as Energizer. Remember: potassium, although it is also alkaline, is better not to use in order to obtain gas from water. In progress chemical reaction it can ignite.

Sources:

• Isolation and production of hydrogen

From natural gas You can't get real gasoline. But from it you can synthesize methanol, which in itself is an excellent alternative to gasoline.

Contrary to popular belief, it is impossible to produce gasoline from natural gas. When we talk about producing gasoline from gas, we are talking about the synthesis of methyl alcohol, which can be used as a high-octane additive for gasoline or as an independent fuel.

Methanol is the new gasoline

The principle of producing methanol from natural gas is that the gas elevated temperature gives a reaction to water vapor and catalysts, as a result of which the so-called “synthesis gas” is first formed, from which, in turn, is formed.

Research shows that methyl alcohol can be used as a high-octane additive to regular gasoline. In addition, methanol can be used as a fuel on its own - its octane number is 115.

A car engine that is fueled with methyl alcohol instead of gasoline lasts much longer. At the same time, just by replacing one type of fuel with another, engine power automatically increases by 20%. There are no harmful impurities in the exhaust gases of a car running on methyl alcohol.

Producing alcohol from gas

An apparatus for producing methanol from natural gas can be constructed independently. It consists of two tubes - one of them is connected to a tap with cold water, the other - to a source of natural gas (or cylinder). The ends of both tubes enter a mixer, in which the mixture of gas and water vapor is heated by a burner to a temperature of about 100-120 degrees. From the mixer, the gas-water mixture enters a reactor filled with a catalyst. The catalyst consists of 25% nickel and 75% aluminum. In the reactor, under the influence of high temperature (about 500 degrees) and a catalyst, a synthesis gas consisting of hydrogen and carbon monoxide is formed from a gas-water mixture.

Next, the hot synthesis gas enters the refrigerator, where it is cooled to a temperature of 35-40 degrees and enters a compressor, where it is compressed to a pressure of several atmospheres. In the next stage, the synthesis gas enters a second reactor filled with a catalyst consisting of a mixture of 20% zinc and 80% copper. Here, at a temperature of 270 degrees, methanol is formed from the synthesis gas, which is then condensed in the refrigerator and poured into a container.

According to people experimenting with producing methanol from natural gas, under conditions it is possible to produce about 3-5 liters of methanol per hour. At the same time, the cost of such fuel is just a few.

Attention!

Remember that methanol is poison. Its vapors are flammable. The slightest leak of natural gas from gas stove or methanol production apparatus may cause an explosion.

obtained by the Voronezh inventor.

Voronezh resident Vladimir KOMAROV doesn’t care about world oil prices. He recently produced oil, the cost of which is at least six times lower than that produced by OPEC countries. Petrovich did not drill a well in the middle of the yard, but simply brought to fruition his so-called Russian reactor, with which he demonstrated new way disposal of solid household waste and received something between fuel oil and diesel fuel.

Vladimir Komarov developed his own technology for recycling municipal solid waste (MSW) and designed a molecular reactor, which has no analogues in the world. The garbage that gets into it is burned at a temperature of 1500 degrees, forming a synthetic gas close to methane, which can run car engines and city boiler houses. In this nature-friendly way, you can destroy not only iron or glass, but also pesticides. Petrovich recently improved his invention.

The main advantage of my technology is that it allows us to make small reactors designed for two or three KamAZ trucks of garbage,” explains Komarov. - For regional centers and villages, as well as farms, this would be a solution not only for many environmental problems. This would give about 2.5 more tons of fuel! Using the catalyst I invented, a 10-hectare landfill with 20-meter hills of garbage can be destroyed in a month. And at the same time get about 900 tons of diesel fuel. One catch - will there be enough old tires for all the landfills?

Let's help the Koreans

Petrovich’s last mysterious remark was explained Yuri Shapovalov, Professor of the Department of "Machines and Apparatuses" chemical production» Voronezh Technological Academy:

In order to obtain heating oil when burning solid waste on an industrial scale, which is something between diesel fuel and fuel oil, it is necessary to burn old tires along with the garbage, at least 50 percent of it total mass. Today we can only roughly estimate how much is thrown away each year. The main thing in Komarov’s invention is the environmentally friendly destruction of waste with the ability to heat rooms. For a city of a million people, 20 reactors would be enough, each of which would also work as a boiler room. And obtaining fuel oil is an additional opportunity. For Vladivostok, for example, it is very relevant. There a big problem recycling of old tires from Japanese cars. Komarov's phone has already been cut off.

The brainy Voronezh resident is called not only by Russian officials in charge of housing and communal services in the vast expanses of our vast country, but even from South Korea. Some want to buy technology, others want ready-made reactors. Their serial production will soon begin in the Belgorod region. The cost of one is approximately 10 million rubles, it pays off in less than a year.

By the way

* The predecessor of the Russian Komarov reactor were devices for processing solid waste using the Fischer-Tropsch method. For them, German chemists Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch, who developed the technology of the process of catalytic hydrogenation of coal to produce synthetic fuel in the 20s and 30s of the last century, together with two colleagues, were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1931.

Today, gasoline prices are constantly rising, even despite the fact that the cost of oil is falling all the time. This makes local craftsmen think about finding an alternative to an increasingly expensive product. But is it possible to make gasoline at home, and how can this be done? We are all sure that gasoline can only be produced at large industrial enterprises. However, is this really so?

Look around: what can be made from oil

Very many of the objects around us, to a large extent or to a lesser extent consists of oil. Clothing, a toothbrush, a TV, an electric kettle, a lamp, dishes, toys, and many other items that we use in everyday life are made of plastic and, therefore, are the result of the chemical industry using oil.

Oil is one of the most valuable and widely used types of raw materials. The states that own its vast deposits can be said to control the world economy and processes.

For thousands of years, people have studied natural resources and tried to extract from them useful qualities. Having studied the structure of oil, chemists found out that many things can be made from it. healthy products, and now human life is surrounded by many objects, things and means that are made precisely from black gold. Under certain pressure and temperature, various unnecessary impurities are removed from oil and pure petroleum products are created.

Oil objects that surround us:

• Fuel;
• Plastic;
• Polyethylene and plastic;
• Synthetics;
• Cosmetical tools;
• Medicines;
• Household and household items.

It is almost impossible to list all the products that are made from petroleum. Total can be determined by a figure within 6000 of such products.

What is made from coal: making gasoline at home

Experts say that in order to make gasoline from coal simply at home, there are two very interesting and proven methods. They were developed by German scientists in the early years of the last century. During the great period Patriotic War all German technology ran on coal diesel fuel. After all, in Germany and the Federal Republic of Germany there were no oil fields, but production and refining coal worked fine. The Germans made liquid diesel fuel and excellent synthetic gasoline from brown coal.

From point of view chemical compounds Coal is not much different from oil. They have one base - hydrogen and the flammable element carbon. True, there is less hydrogen in coal, however, a combustible mixture can be obtained if the hydrogen indicators are equalized.

One ton of coal can produce up to 80 kg of gasoline. However, our coal should contain about 35% volatile substances. At the beginning of processing, the coal is crushed to a powder state. After that, the coal dust is well dried and mixed with fuel oil or oil to obtain a paste-like mass. After adding the missing hydrogen, the raw material is placed in a specialized autoclave and heated to a temperature of 500 degrees, while pumping a pressure of 200 bar.

Gasoline from garbage at home: expert opinion

After doing some research, scientists from the Tomsk Research Institute came to the conclusion that gasoline can be made from a lot of waste that we throw in the trash without even thinking about its possible further use.

Experiments by scientists have proven that from one kilogram of crushed plastic bottles, about one liter of fuel is obtained - gasoline.

These scientists in Tomsk developed special installation, which processes carbon-containing waste into synthetic fuel. Its effect is that under the influence of high temperature, carbon-containing substances in plastic are destroyed, and as a result of the synthesis of hydrogen and carbons, the necessary gasoline molecules are obtained. And when a large amount of gasoline is produced, it is possible to obtain fuel oil, gasoline of any brand, and diesel fuel.

Scientists say that today you can get gasoline yourself not only from plastic bottles, suitable for this:

• Rubber tires;
• Garbage;
• Firewood;
• Pallets;
• Leaves;
• Nut shells;
• Husk from seeds;
• Waste sawdust and rubber;
• Corn cobs;
• Peat;
• Straw;
• Reed;
• Weeds;
• Cane;
• Old sleepers;
• Dry bird and animal manure;
• Medical waste.

And that's not yet full list objects that are suitable for extracting from them substances so necessary to ensure life.

Making gasoline from rubber tires with your own hands

Oil is a flammable liquid of natural origin. It consists of all kinds of hydrocarbons, as well as a certain amount of other organic substances. The production of gasoline from oil extracted in the ground is the destiny of oil refineries, but as an interesting experiment, it is possible to obtain it in small quantities at home.

For this you will need:

• 3 fireproof containers;
• Rubber waste;
• Distiller;
• Bake.

Keep children away. Having prepared a container with a tight-fitting lid, you need to attach a heat-resistant tube. This will be our retort. Any container will suit us for the condenser, but in order to make a water seal, we need to find a durable vessel with two tubes. It is necessary to assemble this device for liquid hydrocarbons, connect the pipe from the retort lid to the condenser, and insert the hose. Connect its second end to the water seal tube. We connect the second valve tube to the furnace and place the retort on it. We get a closed system for the production of high-temperature pyrolysis. All we have to do is load the rubber tires and wait for gasoline at the exit.

How to make gasoline at home (video)

Oil is today the main source of energy and synthetic materials on Earth. It is difficult to imagine our world without cars, electricity, airplanes and other things. A lot depends on oil, and it seems that we ourselves depend on it. But isn't it time for us to find others, alternative ways extracting fuel from the funds that lie under our feet? It’s so simple – take and recycle garbage. Much easier than draining Natural resources and depend on those who extract them.