Liquid Fuels From Algae Show Many Advantages

Algae – black, slimy, and obnoxious – just may be the next black gold of energy products, especially for liquid fuels! While other agriculture products have gotten a head start as possible replacements for crude oil, the best candidate currently is one of the lowest forms in the plant kingdom, algae.

For well-known reasons ranging from perceived running out of crude oil to placating environmentalists, there is a current demand to find new, renewal fuel sources. Ethanol as an additive to gasoline and various biodiesels from different agricultural products have taken center stage in efforts to date. Ethanol has many disadvantages from efficiency to economics and none of the agricultural oils have sufficient oil production to meet the requirements for replacing fossil fuels.

Algae, especially the microalgae which are organisms less than 0.4mm in diameter and capable of photosynthesis as opposed to larger algae such as seaweed, has shown such promise that many large and small companies have active programs to commercialize fuel from the plant. The list of advantages continues to grow as more work is done to make the product commercial. The advantages of microalgae come from its simple structure, the ability to genetically engineer many its properties, its fast growth rate, and perhaps most important, its high oil content for certain species. Additional benefits are possible as growing algae takes large quantities of carbon dioxide, which can be obtained from power plants, and other large fuel consumers’ exhaust stacks. Also, water for production can be of low quality, allowing the use of wastewater and sewage effluents.

Most people think of algae as an environmental nuisance and, in more extreme cases, as an environmental threat. While there are some fears that as a commercial enterprise, raising algae could have environmental dangers, under proper conditions and practices this should be of no concern. Further, environmentalists accept biofuels though they give off the same carbon dioxide as fossil fuels when burned. The difference is biofuels take up carbon dioxide in their growth so that on combustion there is no new carbon dioxide put into the environment. Fossil fuels release carbon dioxide from historical times and add to the current balance.

With proper genetic design, microalgae can produce high amounts of oil very similar to crude oil for the production of various fuels ranging from gasoline and diesel to jet fuel. The oil produced can easily be processed in existing refineries to make commercial products. Different from other agriculture products, algae now play no role in the food chain and would not be in competition for food uses. This is a major problem with ethanol, which competes for corn used in food products.

The potential volume of oil possible from algae compared to other bioproducts might be its most important feature. Algae feeding on sunlight, a little carbon dioxide and nutrients, grows at incredible rates. Some species can double their population twice a day and some can produce extraordinary amounts of oil. Nick Hodge in the publication, Green Chip Stocks, July 2008, gives the following information on oil from various agricultural crops.

More current information has some producers (Valcent Products in California) claiming oil yields as high as 150,000 gallons per acre. The oil, which is the lipids in the algae, could go to a refinery for fuel production while the carbohydrates could be fermented and made into ethanol and other products.