Waste-to-Energy Plant & Zombies

[Onkl]

Hi guys

I am playing in a zombie-apocalypse campagin which takes place today in our hometown of Solothurn, Switzerland.

We're now three sessions in and the question of a fortified camp has come up. We all agreed on the local Waste-to-Energy Incineration Plant called KEBAG. Since the plant is beset by two rivers (Aare and Emme), has a railroad connection as well as a water treatment plant and it is gated in.

We figured it was a pretty cool place to stay, if we can keep the burners running.

My idea was that we could use bulldozers shove the cut up zombie pieces into the incinerator to keep us powered up.

Is this at all possible? The way I understand these incinerators they only need burners to fire them up, or if the burned material is unsuitable...

So, how well do bodies burned? Well enough to keep us powered up?

Cheers and a merry Xmas!

[Hemlock]

it's my understanding that the human body (and therefore a reanimated human body) is about 70-75% water by volume ... so unless your incinerators are able to burn water as a fuel source (highly unlikely), the zombies would not be a suitable fuel for your idea.

AFAIK, most trash incinerators use 'regular' trash i.e. kitchen waste, paper, magazines, junk mail, clothing ... i.e. stuff that actually burns. Crematoriums (used for disposing of human remains) don't burn the body so much as expose the corpse of the deceased to excessive heat (usually from natural gas) and let most of the corpse evaporate before the corpse itself catches fire. (It is occasionally useful to have cousins in the mortuary industry).

Also, although the railroad terminal presents interesting possibilities, the two rivers may actually be a weakness. Unless you can effectively fence off the underwater portion of the river (unlikely in a post apocalyptic scenario), the undead will be able to use the river bed as an avenue of approach into your compound. And you won't see them coming until they are emerging from the river ... not a happy thing.

[Onkl]

Originally Posted by Hemlock

it's my understanding that the human body (and therefore a reanimated human body) is about 70-75% water by volume ... so unless your incinerators are able to burn water as a fuel source (highly unlikely), the zombies would not be a suitable fuel for your idea.

Unless we could get rid of the water somehow first, dry them out... yeah, you make perfect sense... It's hard to burn water :P

Originally Posted by Hemlock

Also, although the railroad terminal presents interesting possibilities, the two rivers may actually be a weakness. Unless you can effectively fence off the underwater portion of the river (unlikely in a post apocalyptic scenario), the undead will be able to use the river bed as an avenue of approach into your compound. And you won't see them coming until they are emerging from the river ... not a happy thing.

One river is very shallow, the other one is deep...

I think the deep one could be able to pull the zombies with them... the shallow one could be problem...

Here's a map of the location

Cheers!

ps. Coming to think of it... we should get to a biogas facility, there you should be able to make methane from the zombie corpses... or something similar. ;)

[Nereidalbel]

If you dehydrate the zombies first, then sure, fatty tissues will burn. Otherwise, you need considerable heat to actually burn a human.

[RyanW]

Also, what effect might breathing in the fumes of burning them have?

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Also, what effect might breathing in the fumes of burning them have?

If the virus responsible for zombies can become airborne via smoke, you've doomed everybody!

[Onkl]

So far we have found nearly zero survivors... whatever happened... it has doomed us all.. or so we think!

It would be devious of the GM to make the fumes of the zombie corpses infectious...

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by Onkl

So far we have found nearly zero survivors... whatever happened... it has doomed us all.. or so we think!

It would be devious of the GM to make the fumes of the zombie corpses infectious...

It would make sense, though.