Local resident Mike Cox is more than just a scientist
– he’s a visionary. He sees a world where garbage can be used to
create the energy we need to power our homes, help run our vehicles
and abandon our reliance on petroleum. It’s been his life’s work
for the last 30 years and now, Cox believes, he has made it a
reality. “It’s all about tur
ning something good out of a bad thing,” he said.
Local resident Mike Cox is more than just a scientist – he’s a visionary.
He sees a world where garbage can be used to create the energy we need to power our homes, help run our vehicles and abandon our reliance on petroleum. It’s been his life’s work for the last 30 years and now, Cox believes, he has made it a reality.
“It’s all about turning something good out of a bad thing,” he said.
Cox, the founder and president of Anaerobe Systems Inc. in Morgan Hill, says he has discovered a process in which anaerobic bacteria synthesize glucose from organic matter to create hydrogen – an element that can be burned for energy with no pollution. In layman’s terms, he uses bacteria to turn the sugar from garbage into energy.
“Hydrogen is an energy source,” Cox said. “It’s the number one universal currency in the biological economy.”
Through his studies of anaerobic bacteria, Cox said he realized the energy producing potential of common bacteria in the environment. Though some anaerobes can be harmful and deadly to humans, they also possess the ability to break down chemical compounds into smaller parts.
“In the process of identifying the bacteria, I realized they can produce hydrogen,” Cox explained.
He estimates that from 10 pounds of sugar gleaned from various vegetable parts, he can create one pound of hydrogen or about 62,000 BTUs – approximately one dollar’s worth of energy. As he increases the sugar, he can increase the yields in a process that only takes about six hours to begin producing hydrogen.
All the petroleum on earth was created in a similar way by bacteria hundreds and thousands of years ago, Cox said. The bacteria ate organic matter and turned it into the petroleum that runs the world today – using only 15 percent of the matter and leaving 85 percent of it as fuel.
Cox has discovered a similar process through his research. Common organic matter such as bell pepper parts, potato skins and garlic can be digested by bacteria to create an abundant source of hydrogen, Cox claims.
The secret lies in photosynthesis – the process in which green plants create carbohydrates using carbon dioxide and water by using light as an energy source. Photosynthesis creates the carbohydrates, a molecular form of sugar, which anaerobic bacteria use as food, Cox said.
“Anaerobes take out the sugar from food and eat it and their waste product is hydrogen,” Cox explained.
Though the idea of producing energy from garbage seems far-fetched, it already is a reality at Cox’s business. He uses hydrogen he creates at his business to generate enough electricity to power his small plant.
That is just the tip of the iceberg, he said, claiming his new system is also an efficient way to create hydrogen on a larger scale. Though hydrogen is believed by many scientists as the solution to the impending energy crisis, isolating the element is often expensive and time consuming.
Cox said, there are many kinds of anaerobes. It’s identifying the anaerobes that make the hydrogen that’s complicated. He said other scientists have tried and have not been successful.
“What we’re bringing to the party is the knowledge of anaerobes and what they’ll eat and what they’ll make,” said Cox.
The Morgan Hill microbiologist has been studying this subject for over three decades, ever since he wrote a business plan in 1977. “Our process is very reproducible,” he said.
Cox believes enough hydrogen could be produced through his process to fuel the world – literally.
Food waste is an inexhaustible resource, he said, and he already has contracted with George Chiala Farms to use waste from their bell pepper business in Morgan Hill.
“I’m excited to be a part of Mike Cox’s project,” owner George Chiala said. “It costs us a lot to dispose of these by-products and send them out in the fields. If we can turn it into a positive thing, I’m all for it. We know it can be done. We’ve tried it in a small scale. We have a great man in Mike Cox.”
Every day, Chiala disposes of 120,000 pounds of bell pepper cores, stems, and seeds.
“That’s energy wasted in the fields,” Cox said. “We can make hydrogen from this.”
Now that he has discovered the process, Cox has moved from the lab to the scale-up process. He plans to set up a pilot plant at Chiala Farms and Anaerobe Systems within the next six months, and if all goes well, the next step is taking orders. In this food processing company, and hopefully, others, Cox hopes to convert agricultural waste into hydrogen using anaerobic bacteria. The process will reduce waste produced by food processing companies that would otherwise go to cattlefields and landfills, and at the same time, produce hydrogen at these sites to enable these companies to supply their own power.
Cox isn’t the only scientist who believes his plan will work.
“Mike Cox is a wonderful person. He gives the answer to two problems, energy and waste,” said Dr. Kristien Mortelmans, director of the microbiology program at SRI International, an independent, nonprofit research institute conducting contract research and development for government agencies, commercial businesses and other organizations.
“He has, I believe, proof of concept and demonstrated it can be done,” said Mortelmans. “There is a fair amount of skepticism because there hasn’t been much study about it, especially in the U.S. The trick to it is you have to understand how these organisms behave, and Mike does. I really believe in the power of bugs.”
Mortelmans has enough faith in Cox that SRI has agreed to provide contractual services for chemical analysis and measurements to help Cox increasing the scale of the fermentation process.
Ultimately, Cox envisions a world where farms not only produce food, but also energy. His process will allow the farmers to reduce their waste while creating energy. When the conversion is finished, Cox said, the byproducts are all useful substances. Aside from hydrogen, he says, the bacteria also leaves behind other chemicals, including several acids, raw elements used in plastics, and soil additives.
“There will be a day when we’re planting crops for fuel, not just food,” he said. “We’ll take sub-par produce and other wastes and turn it into energy.”
Cox, like many scientists throughout the world, believe hydrogen is the long-term energy solution – the antidote to the country’s dependence on foreign oil. Before even gas hit $3 a gallon a few weeks ago, Cox already predicted it would skyrocket to $4 a gallon by the end of the year.
“We’ve had a hundred years of easy energy and that’s no longer true. Inexpensive energy is a thing of the past,” said Cox. “I see gas prices reaching $10 to $12 a gallon, if we don’t do something.”
And as fuel source, hydrogen is clean. Its only byproduct is heat and water.
Cox admits his discovery cannot power automobiles, but it can help create electricity to power hybrid cars, he said.
Hydrogen has numerous uses aside from powering automobiles, Cox said.
“You can send them (hydrogen) to a traditional engine generator and convert it to electricity,” he said. “You can take hydrogen through a fuel cell to make electricity and distilled water as is done on the space shuttle, or you can set up a business relation with large gas suppliers. Hydrogen’s largest use is refining petroleum to make cleaner gas and to treat iron to make different grades of steel. The price of steel went up 20 percent today.”
While there are companies that make hydrogen through methods involving the processing of chemicals, methane gas and hydrocarbons, Cox said he is taking the biological approach. Unlike the hydrogen to methane conversion process, which is capital intensive and wastes energy, Cox said the bacterial conversion of sugar to hydrogen is easy to accomplish and it’s safer than other fuels like natural gas, diesel and propane.
Cox is convinced this is the route to take in answer to the country’s energy problems.
“Last week’s high gas prices was just a wake-up call,” he said. “Natural gas prices have increased 600 percent in the last three to four years. We’re just in the beginning of the slipping slope.”
He pointed to the Kirby Canyon landfill.
“That’s an example of potential energy being wasted,” he said. “We are in an extreme energy crisis, we have the ability to process the waste there and produce energy. We can run an entire plant on what they’re throwing away. Next year, they predict the energy supply will be 5 percent less than the demand. We can reproduce the entire petrochemical industry from crops.”
That’s exactly what Cox plans to do eventually. As a steady flame burned from hydrogen he created with bacteria and food waste, Cox eagerly pointed to rows of sterilized jars filled with garlic juices and waste in his laboratory.
“Look at that. That’s our waste. But it’s also our source of energy!” he said.
Rose Meily is a staff writer and City Editor at the Morgan Hill Times. Reach her at 779-4106 or rm****@mo*************.com
