Seville Goes Green with Orange-Made Electricity

When life throws you lemons, you make lemonade. But what if it throws you oranges? Make some juice – the electrical kind, of course!

In the Spanish city of Seville, 50 000 trees produce 5.7 million kilogram of bitter oranges annually. However, if left unused, a vast majority of these fruits then end up squashed and decaying on sidewalks.

That is why Emasesa – a local water and sewage company – is launching a pilot project through which they will use these leftover oranges to squeeze out some electricity.

The juice of oranges is naturally rich in fructose, which consists of very short carbon chains. Once they begin to ferment, they produce high quantities of methane.

A facility that already generates electricity from organic matter will house over 30 000 kilograms of unused oranges, with the methane used to power its generator and produce electricity.

Through Emasesa’s project, it is hoped that 150 households will receive power. If successful, they may increase the orange usage to over 1 500 000 kilograms, thus powering up 73 000 households.

Talk about incredible green energy … or in this case, orange energy.