Economical Biodiesel Fuel from Algae

We all want to live in a clean and green world and breathe pollution free air. For this kind of environment we desperately need a fossil fuel free world. Scientists are toiling hard to come up with alternative fuels which can replace conventional fuels. One such study was presented at the 237th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society. This study throws interesting light on the first economical, eco-friendly process to transform algae oil into biodiesel fuel. The scientists are quite hopeful that one day America will become independent of fossil fuels. Ben Wen is the lead researcher and vice president of United Environment and Energy LLC, Horseheads, N.Y. According to him, “This is the first economical way to produce biodiesel from algae oil. It costs much less than conventional processes because you would need a much smaller factory, there are no water disposal costs, and the process is considerably faster.”

Processing cost is a great hurdle for manufacturing biodiesel from algae. But New York researchers claim that their pioneer method is at least forty percent cheaper than the current manufacturing processes. We already have necessary infrastructure for supply of biodiesel fuel. Amount of algae is also not a problem. We have abundance of algae growing in the major water bodies of the world, be it ocean, lakes or rivers. The research team calls this method “continuously flowing fixed-bed.” According to the team members, this process will not produce wastewater which causes pollution. Ben Wen also explains that algae has an “oil-per-acre production rate 100-300 times the amount of soybeans, and offers the highest yield feedstock for biodiesel and the most promising source for mass biodiesel production to replace transportation fuel in the United States.”

They are also using a proprietary solid catalyst developed in their laboratory. Other biodiesel producing firms are using liquid catalysts. Liquid catalysts cannot be used again and again but solid catalysts can be utilized repeatedly. The second key advantage of having a solid catalyst is that a continuous flowing production of biodiesel can be maintained. The same is not true with liquid catalysts. Using liquid catalyst is time consuming too. Workers have to take extra half hour after producing each batch to create more biodiesel. Liquid catalyst is present in the biodiesel. So to get rid of the liquid catalyst workers need to purify the biodiesel by neutralizing the base catalyst by adding acid. But by using solid catalyst no such action is needed.

Ben Wen is trying to test the new waters. He is thinking big. According to him, his firm is currently conducting a pilot program for the process with a production capacity of nearly 1 million gallons of algae biodiesel per year. Depending upon the size of the machinery and the plant, he said it is possible that a company can produce up to 50 million gallons of algae biodiesel every year.

But this is not all. There is icing on the cake. Wen explains further that the solid catalyst continuous flow method can be tailored into mobile units so that smaller companies wouldn’t have to construct plants and the military could use the process in the field.

Source : http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/economical-biodiesel-fuel-from-algae/

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Algae Biofuels Of The Future

Algae fix the sunlight and carbon dioxide into energy and that too very fast. Scientists want to utilize this quality for alternative fuels. And when it comes to greener alternatives to fossil fuel what could be greener than pond scum? Why algae are more suitable over other bio-fuels? Algae can grow anywhere, practically anywhere. They can grow in sea-water or salty water or adulterated water or even in sewage. They can bear extreme temperature. They can grow on waste-land. Another good thing about algae is they multiply very fast. They can double their weight many times in a single day. Algae produce oil as a byproduct of photosynthesis. They can produce fifteen times more oil per acre than other plants such as corn and switchgrass.

If we want to single out the biggest two advantages of algae as bio-fuels, the first one can be these plants grow well where carbon dioxide is in excess and another is these plants can grow in sewages.

“We have to prove these two things to show that we really are getting a free lunch,” said Lisa Colosi, a professor of civil and environmental engineering who is part of an interdisciplinary University of Virginia research team, recently funded by a new U.Va. Collaborative Sustainable Energy Seed Grant worth about $30,000.

If we let the algae grow naturally then the oil yield will be low, around one percent by the weight of the algae. The U.Va. team theorizes that if more carbon dioxide and organic material would be available to the algae, oil yield can be increased to as much as 40 percent by weight.

Keeping in mind the quality of algae that it grows well on industrial solids and where carbon dioxide is available in excess, it can be helpful in dealing with industrial solids. Cleaning industrial solids is very expensive otherwise. Algae can also be used to minimize the emissions of carbon dioxide of coal plants.

Research partner Mark White, a professor at the McIntire School of Commerce, will help the team quantify the big-picture environmental and economic benefits of algae biofuel compared to soy-based biodiesel, under different sets of assumptions.

The third team member, Andres Clarens, a professor of civil and environmental engineering has expertise in separating the oil produced by the algae. They will try to extract oil from algae on a very small scale. Later on they will tackle the basic issues like whether it makes a difference to grind up the organic material before feeding it to the algae.

Source : http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/algae-biofuels-future/

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Biofuel in the picture: Algae

Due to high oil prices and the competing demands between foods and other biofuel sources, such as palm and soybeans, due to the world’s food crisis, interest in biofuel from Algae is higher than ever before. Algae are one of the fastest growing plant species in the world. Some strains of algae can even grow so rapidly that they double in size every day, producing large amounts of lipids (oils). The compositions of these lipids are somewhat similar to petroleum molecules and scientists have figured out how to transform these lipids into biofuels.

It is said that, due the prolific ability of algae, algae can produce over 7,500 gallons of fuel per acre in a single year. Compared to soybeans, which is the main source of biodiesel in the United States, algae produces 150 times more biofuel per acre per year. If we would displace all of the petroleum that the United States uses for transportation in a single year and use biofuel from algae instead, we only need a little more than 1% of the total landmass in the United States to produce all the algae we need.

Furthermore, algae are not only quick growers, they also use carbon dioxide as a nutrient source. Another attractive characteristic of algae is that they do not affect fresh water resources, they can be produced using contaminated or ocean water and are biodegradable, which means that they are relatively harmless to the environment if something bad would happen. The ability of algae to grow almost everywhere gives producers the opportunity to grow them on marginal or desert land. This means that algae will not compete with crops for fertile soil.

Growing Algae

There are several ways to grow algae, some companies are growing algae in big open ponds others use photo-bioreactors to grow the algae under perfect conditions. The big open ponds may represent the most closely thing to nature, they are not as efficient at controlling the amount of light and nutrients that the algae must receive for optimal growth. Photobioreactors (PBR) on the other hand, are enclosed vessels that manipulate algae’s environment for maximum lipid growth. PBR’s are tubes pumped with nutrient-laden water which are exposed to sunlight. Where photo-bioreactors may have much higher yields compared to open ponds, PBR’s are a lot more expensive due to the build of acres of plastic tubes.

Another method to grow algae is fermentation. With fermentation algae are grown in dark steel drums with no access to light. All the algae get is a consistent supply of sugar. The costs of these technologies (open pond, PBR, fermentation) still need to be refined in order to become cost effective. Because the technology of extracting biofuel from algae is still in its infancy costs are expected to go down in the next coming years. As of 2008, biofuel from algae remains too expensive to replace other commercially available fuels where costs of various algae typically generate around 5 to 10 dollars per kilogram.

Future: Algae farms next to power plants

An expert team of the University of Virginia hypothesizes that when you feed algae more carbon dioxide and organic material, it could boost the lipids (oil) yield by as much as 40%. This would not suggest that biofuel from algae is carbon neutral, but it does give us the potential to cut current emission by for example placing algae farms near power plants. These power plants, such as coal power plants, produce gas which contain about 10 to 30 times as much carbon dioxide as normal air. Connecting these two together would reduce total emissions by a significant factor, eliminating the introduction of new carbon dioxide into the air.

Source : http://www.tomorrowisgreener.com/biofuel-in-the-picture-algae/

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Algae: The ultimate in renewable energy

Texas may be best known for "Big Oil." But the oil that could some day make a dent in the country's use of fossil fuels is small. Microscopic, in fact: algae. Literally and figuratively, this is green fuel.

"Algae is the ultimate in renewable energy," Glen Kertz, president and CEO of Valcent Products, told CNN while conducting a tour of his algae greenhouse on the outskirts of El Paso.

Kertz, a plant physiologist and entrepreneur, holds about 20 patents. And he is psyched about the potential algae holds, both as an energy source and as a way to deal with global warming.
"We are a giant solar collecting system. We get the bulk of our energy from the sunshine," said Kertz.
Algae are among the fastest growing plants in the world, and about 50 percent of their weight is oil. That lipid oil can be used to make biodiesel for cars, trucks, and airplanes.

Most people know algae as "pond scum." And until recently, most energy research and development projects used ponds to grow it.
But instead of ponds, Valcent uses a closed, vertical system, growing the algae in long rows of moving plastic bags. The patented system is called Vertigro, a joint venture with Canadian alternative energy company Global Green Solutions. The companies have invested about $5 million in the Texas facility. "A pond has a limited amount of surface area for solar absorption," said Kertz.

"By going vertical, you can get a lot more surface area to expose cells to the sunlight. It keeps the algae hanging in the sunlight just long enough to pick up the solar energy they need to produce, to go through photosynthesis," he said. Kertz said he can produce about 100,000 gallons of algae oil a year per acre, compared to about 30 gallons per acre from corn; 50 gallons from soybeans.

Using algae as an alternative fuel is not a new idea. The U.S. Department of Energy studied it for about 18 years, from 1978 to 1996. But according to Al Darzins of the DOE's National Renewable Energy Lab, in 1996 the feds decided that algae oil could never compete economically with fossil fuels.
The price of a barrel of oil in 1996? About 20 bucks! Government scientists experimented with algae in open ponds in California, Hawaii, and in Roswell, New Mexico.

But that involved a lot of land area, with inherent problems of evaporation and contamination from other plant species and various flying and swimming critters. Darzins said NREL switched from algae research to focus on cellulosic ethanol. That's ethanol made from plants like switchgrass and plant stover -- the leaves and stalks left after a harvest -- but not edible crops such as corn and soybeans.

Valcent research scientist Aga Pinowska said there are about 65,000 known algae species, with perhaps hundreds of thousands more still to be identified. A big part of the research at the west Texas facility involves determining what type of algae produces what type of fuel. One species may be best suited for jet fuel, while the oil content of another may be more efficient for truck diesel. In the Vertigro lab, Pinowska studies the care and feeding of algae for just such specifics. She said even small changes in the nutrients that certain algae get can help create a more efficient oil content. And she said a knowledge of algae's virtues goes way back.

"Even the Aztecs knew it was beneficial; they used it as a high protein food," said Pinowska.
The other common commercial use of algae today is as a health food drink, usually sold as "Spirulina."

I'm too sexy for my pond
And who knew that single celled plants could be such "hotties" when it comes to sex? Kertz said it's a real "algae orgy" under the microscope. Some algae reproduce sexually, some asexually, while many combine both modes. In some green algae the type of reproduction may be altered if there are changes in environmental conditions, such as lack of moisture or nutrients. Intriguing details like that keep Kertz and other scientists searching for more and different algae. While dusty west Texas may not be the best hunting grounds, he said he is always on the lookout for samples in puddles, streams or ponds.

Locating algae processing plants intelligently can add to their efficiency. Locating algae facilities next to carbon producing power plants, or manufacturing plants, for instance, the plants could sequester the C02 they create and use those emissions to help grow the algae, which need the C02 for photosynthesis.

And after more than a decade hiatus, the U.S. government is back in the algae game. The 2007 Energy Security and Independence Act includes language promoting the use of algae for biofuels. From the Pentagon to Minnesota to New Zealand, both governments and private companies are exploring the use of algae to produce fuel.

But Al Darzins of the National Renewable Energy Lab said the world is still probably 5 to 10 years away from any substantial use of biofuels. "There's not any one system that anyone has chosen yet. Whatever it is has to be dirt, dirt cheap," said Darzins.

Source : http://teknologihasilperikanan-unsri.blogspot.com/search/label/Biofuel

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