Green Energy Kiln?

[ALIEN!]

Anyone running their kiln off a solar power system here? Or any green energy, wind, fire burning kiln, etc?

[Neko]

Mine runs on desperation

[Waffles]

a friend of mine has an awesome brick oven that he bakes amazing bread in it. He puts wood in there and lights it on fire, then takes the coals and ashes out when they are through and the oven stays at 1050 - 1100 for hours.

[Dragon's Fire Glass]

it's really hard and expensive to attain the needed amps to run a kiln on any of those options... solar just simply isn't capable of producing anywhere near that kind of amps.. wind is a little closer but still to expensive and needs to massive to support such amperes to run a kiln... and well as most environmental buffs will state wood burning of any kind is not "green" in any manner... the best option for being green or even environmentally friendly is a PM. generator of any design and is most cost effective.... but to any who attempt it I'll say good luck and please if I'm mistaking then someone please inform me as such for I don't see any other way that is both "green" and cost effective.:chilling:

[ALIEN!]

trying to figure out a system for off the grid kilning without the need of a fuel burning generator. Solar could do it I think, but would probably be in the $20,000+ range just for one full time 120v kiln. ^Haven't looked into permanent magnet generators really, although I do have a nice one that I pulled from a treadmill, but I think you'd need a fuckton of them.

[PyroChixRock]

Matt and I tried to live off grid for awhile and it was insanely expensive to run the kiln. We had a great solar power set up and back up generators but the kiln took so much power it always kicked the generators on...which ended up costing WAY more than living on the grid. this was in 1999-2000 so maybe things are more stable and cost effective now, but also gas/propane costs are higher so probably not.

[Skipjack]

Here is a link for a lady who runs kilns for glass fusing using photovoltaics:

http://www.trezora.com/solar-powered-green-fused-glass-studio.html

[Bglass]

there was a guy on here from arizona many years back that talked about his off grid set up... it cost him like 40K but he ran his whole shop of solar! but i think it was necessity and not by choice.
on another note my buddie here in Portland was approached by the electric company to put up panels on their roof and they had to put up like 6gs but the company put up the extra 20k or more. so now he has a fixed rate of power for the next 20 years or something and it just goes back into the grid. so essentially he doesn't use the panels power per se, but in turn gets an unbelievable rate on electricity that will never change! kinda cool:)

[menty666]

If you lived near a farm perhaps you could contract for pig manure to create a methane powered kiln. There are some small scale generators out there, but they don't burn the stuff for the kiln, per se, they burn it to produce electricity.

[Necoras]

solar just simply isn't capable of producing anywhere near that kind of amps

That's true if you're trying for an electric kiln powered by pv panels, but that's really inefficient. Solar is actually fantastic for generating high heat. Through the judicious use of either Fresnel lenses or parabolic mirrors you can easily get a small area up to kiln temperatures. You could probably get them up to crucible kiln temperatures depending on your latitude, the season, and cloud cover. The problem is temperature control. You'd have to have a system which either superheated a working fluid (some sort of salt most likely) and then controlled how much is running through your kiln walls, or controlled how much light was being focused directly into your kiln. Either is doable, but both require some pretty serious programing and engineering skills. They'll also cost you a lot in time and experimentation.

I would think your best bet for an off grid solution would be a gas kiln powered by propane. I've no idea how much gas you'd end up using, but here in Texas it's not at all uncommon to see large propane tanks not too far from farmhouses. I know that most large furnace kilns are run on gas, but I've never seen a small one run on it.

[LowTideGlass]

most environmental buffs will state wood burning of any kind is not "green" in any manner...


I don't understand why cutting and burning wood is not "green." Sure clear cutting rain forests is one thing, but if you own your land and cut responsibly and plan ahead for future years, how more green and renewable can you get than trees?!?

I'm not exactly talking about a wood fired kiln, since it probably would take an exorbitant amount of wood ( that is pretty much what happened to cape cod, Glassblowers cut down all of the trees, irresponsibly.

But for home heating, cooking, ect., a well managed forest lot makes so much sense to me. :)

[Neko]

I don't understand why cutting and burning wood is not "green." Sure clear cutting rain forests is one thing, but if you own your land and cut responsibly and plan ahead for future years, how more green and renewable can you get than trees?!?

I'm not exactly talking about a wood fired kiln, since it probably would take an exorbitant amount of wood ( that is pretty much what happened to cape cod, Glassblowers cut down all of the trees, irresponsibly.

But for home heating, cooking, ect., a well managed forest lot makes so much sense to me. :)



Air pollution

[LowTideGlass]

What about the air pollution from the production of all the crap solar panels made in China??

[menty666]

What about the air pollution from the production of all the crap solar panels made in China??

make them closer to home so we don't have to ship all the pollution? Jeez, think local!

[LowTideGlass]

Absolutely... I'm just playing devils advocate for questioning the use of wood, which is certainly local! ;)

[Necoras]

The real problem behind a wood burning kiln is that it's probably too dirty for glass. Different ceramic processes require different firing techniques specifically because of the atmosphere changes due to the fuel. It's possible that wood ash will give you scummy glass. You also have the problem with controlling the temperature.

[Ybot]

We have a 3.5kw solar system on our roof and we are producing 19.55 to 22 kwh per day. Atm im running 4 Bearded dragons, 1 water dragon, 6 pythons a hatchy rack and an incubator off that plus the general house hold. I dont think that with a 5kw system you would have any dramas at all running a kiln. It would be producing 35 to 40 kwh a day in spring and summer and thats all 240v for us.

[Dragon's Fire Glass]

We have a 3.5kw solar system on our roof and we are producing 19.55 to 22 kwh per day. Atm im running 4 Bearded dragons, 1 water dragon, 6 pythons a hatchy rack and an incubator off that plus the general house hold. I dont think that with a 5kw system you would have any dramas at all running a kiln. It would be producing 35 to 40 kwh a day in spring and summer and thats all 240v for us.

okay but that is just watts being used what about the amps needed and besides aren't you using DC not AC??? but anyway it's the amps that really matter:chilling: not the watts..... and damn talk about a simple statement being picked apart but anyway I was not referring to the use of any fossil fueled generators I was specifically saying to check into permanent magnets on a slightly larger scale if your a little mechanically inclined.....:devilish:

[Greymatter Glass]

Photovoltaic is cool....but messy.

Geothermal is by far my favorite attempt at "green" energy.

What we really need is fusion power.

And there's always modern nuclear systems.... but that whole thing just makes too many people uncomfortable.

[nicko0]

We have a 3.5kw solar system on our roof and we are producing 19.55 to 22 kwh per day. Atm im running 4 Bearded dragons, 1 water dragon, 6 pythons a hatchy rack and an incubator off that plus the general house hold. I dont think that with a 5kw system you would have any dramas at all running a kiln. It would be producing 35 to 40 kwh a day in spring and summer and thats all 240v for us.

what torch manufacturer makes the bearded and water dragon torches(i assume its water cooled? 6 pythons!!! u must be making giant mibs!

[ReLo442]

LMAO pretty sure he is talkin about REPTILE like the animals...snakes, lizards (dragons), iguanas (water dragon).....eggs incubator

[nicko0]

plant matter is carbon neutral.

i want to believe hemp, wood, etc is a viable fuel to bridge us/ fill the gap as we progress to clean energy