Article

2008-03-25 Science & Technology

First Commercial Algae to biofuel operation

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Posted by mhw 2008-03-25 16:19|| || Front Page|| [3 views ] Top

#1 How does this compare to a similar 1,100 acres of corn, or sugar?

Posted by rjschwarz 2008-03-25 18:07|| 2008-03-25 18:07|| Front Page Top

#2 Realy, the first of april you say?

fascinating.

Posted by Col. B. Guano. (ret.) 2008-03-25 18:23|| 2008-03-25 18:23|| Front Page Top

#3 Basically a Company press release. It will be interesting how it actually pans out. In addition, how much to the output is actually convertible to something useful? I've seen articles about environmental pollution from alcohol plants lately. It seems like the "green" processes can be pretty dirty environmentally. Who knew?

Posted by tipover 2008-03-25 18:23|| 2008-03-25 18:23|| Front Page Top

#4 I find this fascinating. I hope it works.

Posted by Secret Master 2008-03-25 19:05|| 2008-03-25 19:05|| Front Page Top

#5 Bottom line I think they are over optimistic.

Short term enclosed bioreactor (controlled env) experiments fed w/ enriched CO2 have claimed up to an equivalent of 15,000 gal/acre using higher oil content algae species. But this farm is using unenriched atmosphere (AFAIK) and open ponds w/ attendant temp and light swings, infections and prey species that are unavoidable. Others have tried it and given up.

For comparision, 100,000 lbs-algae/acre and 4000 gal-oil/acre is 50 times the yield of soybeans. If these folks can produce even 1/4th as claimed, 1000 gal-oil/acre, that still yields 12X soybeans or 2X palm oil. The non-oil portion can also be used as livestock feed (if low toxicity), produce ethanol (to 100-140 gal/ton) or gasified to produce many hydrocarbon products.

Posted by ed 2008-03-25 19:19|| 2008-03-25 19:19|| Front Page Top

#6 I can picture what would be needed for an efficient operation. Start with about 10' wide, long, shallow canals in parallel rows that connect at the ends, which amount to a snaked, single canal.

Water flows the length of all the canals, with pipes on the bottom to bubble up CO2 and NOx gases. On rails over the canal, a harvester runs the snaking length, first with the flow of water, then against it, raking the algae up and putting it on a sluice/conveyor belt on the side of each canal.

The algae flows to the end of the canals, where it is deposited in another sluice/conveyor belt, running perpendicular to the canals, which takes all the algae to a single dumping point.

All the canals are covered with "self-cleaning" glass, which limits evaporation and keeps the CO2 and NOx gases in, allows in sunlight, but keeps contaminants out.

Once the water reaches the end of the "snake" of canals, it is filtered for reprocessing and sent back to the beginning of the snake.

So all during daylight hours, the accelerated growth of the algae and its processing continue. Because water cooling is mostly through evaporation, a greater problem is keeping the water cool enough in the warmer months.

This might require cool water injections at points along the snake, as well as at its head.

Other, trace minerals will probably need to be added to the water as well, and some toxic algae waste chemicals might need to be removed during filtering as well.

The rest of the process is producing the biodiesel from the algae. This amounts to mixing the algae vegetable oil with alcohol and sodium hydroxide.

Posted by Anonymoose 2008-03-25 21:57|| 2008-03-25 21:57|| Front Page Top

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