Saturday, August 26, 2006
Grow Your Own? American Scientist Online
Here is a balanced article on the possibilities of (and problems with) algal biodiesel...Author: David Schneider, Magazine: American Scientist Online.
Useful read.
Summary & excerpts
1. ...ethanol, which contains only two-thirds the energy of gasoline gallon for gallon, whereas biodiesel ends up being only 2 percent less fuel-efficient than petroleum-based diesel.
2. Conservationists have been warning that palm oil production poses a dire threat to the dwindling population of orangutans, for example, which exist in the wild only in Borneo and Sumatra.
3. Some varieties of algae can contain 50 percent or more oil, and grow much more rapidly than ordinary cultivars—with doubling times that can be as short as several hours.
4...challenges involved in devising a bioreactor that costs little and supports sufficient productivity that excessive land use is not a factor.
5. ...productivities of about 100 grams of algae per meter squared per day (about three times what was demonstrated during the Aquatic Species Program) is needed to achieve commercial viability...
6. "It's no real difficult feat to turn nutrients into algae," says Kent SeaTech's director of research, Jon C. Van Olst, "but how do you get it out of the water? They are almost impossible to harvest."
7. "Growing algae is cheap...but certainly not as cheap as growing palm oil."
8. ..."In the laboratory, you can create some very efficient bioreactors, but it just isn't scalable"...Asked whether biodiesel will ever be made this way: "Not from microalgae—I just can't see it."
Companies & individuals mentioned:
Cos/organizations: US EPA, US DoE & Aquatic Species Program, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Veridium Corp., GreenFuel Technologies, Kent SeaTech Corporation, John R. Benemann, Cyanotech Corporation
Persons: Michael S Briggs, David J Bayless, Isaac Berzin, Jon C. Van Olst, John R. Benemann, Gerald R. Cysewski
Read the full article here
Oilgae - Biodiesel from Algae
Oilgae Blog Home
algOS - Biodiesel from Algae Open Source
Useful read.
Summary & excerpts
1. ...ethanol, which contains only two-thirds the energy of gasoline gallon for gallon, whereas biodiesel ends up being only 2 percent less fuel-efficient than petroleum-based diesel.
2. Conservationists have been warning that palm oil production poses a dire threat to the dwindling population of orangutans, for example, which exist in the wild only in Borneo and Sumatra.
3. Some varieties of algae can contain 50 percent or more oil, and grow much more rapidly than ordinary cultivars—with doubling times that can be as short as several hours.
4...challenges involved in devising a bioreactor that costs little and supports sufficient productivity that excessive land use is not a factor.
5. ...productivities of about 100 grams of algae per meter squared per day (about three times what was demonstrated during the Aquatic Species Program) is needed to achieve commercial viability...
6. "It's no real difficult feat to turn nutrients into algae," says Kent SeaTech's director of research, Jon C. Van Olst, "but how do you get it out of the water? They are almost impossible to harvest."
7. "Growing algae is cheap...but certainly not as cheap as growing palm oil."
8. ..."In the laboratory, you can create some very efficient bioreactors, but it just isn't scalable"...Asked whether biodiesel will ever be made this way: "Not from microalgae—I just can't see it."
Companies & individuals mentioned:
Cos/organizations: US EPA, US DoE & Aquatic Species Program, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Veridium Corp., GreenFuel Technologies, Kent SeaTech Corporation, John R. Benemann, Cyanotech Corporation
Persons: Michael S Briggs, David J Bayless, Isaac Berzin, Jon C. Van Olst, John R. Benemann, Gerald R. Cysewski
Read the full article here
Oilgae - Biodiesel from Algae
Oilgae Blog Home
algOS - Biodiesel from Algae Open Source
Oilgae.com - Oil & Biodiesel from Algae provides links, provides directory and web links resources for the algae-based biofuels & biodiesel. It is intended to be useful for research, information, inputs, news for buyers, sellers, manufacturers, traders, suppliers, producers, exporters and importers of algal oil and algal fuels. It will make an effort to provide info on biofuel feedstock, algal feedstocks, algae oil info and link, details on fuel from algae, bio-fuel, bio-diesel, bio-fuels, algal oils production and uses, and biofuels trade & market resources, data, statistics such as price, prices, demand-supply for buyer, seller, manufacturer, trader, supplier, exporter and producer
PermaLink - Grow Your Own? American Scientist Online posted by Ecacofonix : 6:34 PM
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Transforming wastewater into green gold
Thanks to Michael Cohen for sending me this note. Michael Cohen is a faculty @ Sonoma State Univ., and Catherine a biology student at the university.
From The Press Democrat - see oringial link
Algae-based fuel: Transforming wastewater into green gold
By MICHAEL COHEN AND CATHERINE LAURIA
Global warming, war in the Middle East and - closer to home - millions of gallons of excess treated wastewater.
A potential common solution to these disparate problems lies in the capacity of algae to convert wastewater to fuel. Sounds fanciful, but with help from the sun, algae cultivated on our ever-growing supply of wastewater could satisfy our community's demands for fuel that are currently met by imported gasoline and diesel.
Peoples of the future will marvel at our profligacy in dumping treated wastewater into natural waterways. Locally, we have already begun to find utility for this water through agricultural irrigation and by recharging of The Geysers for geothermal energy.
But perhaps its greatest beneficial use to society - as an algal growth medium - has yet to be exploited.Treated wastewater contains levels of nutrients that can support dense algal growth. Using the sun's energy, algae convert carbon dioxide into biomass while removing excess nutrients from the water. Technology to cultivate and harvest large amounts of algae already exists as do the means to extract their lipids and process them into fuels that can power our cars and trucks (fossil fuels are after all mainly derived from dead algae - not dinosaurs).
Facilities for commercial production of algae-based fuels are now a reality: Aquaflow Bionomic Corporation has begun making biodiesel from algae in New Zealand, Biofuel Systems SL will start operations in Spain in 2007 and GreenFuel Technologies has just started a partnership with an energy company in New York.
Algae can also perform another valuable service: breaking down a variety of organic contaminants that survive other wastewater treatment processes.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, 111 out of 139 streams sampled in 1999 and 2000 contained one or more organic wastewater contaminants, including human and veterinary drugs, natural and synthetic hormones, detergent metabolites, plasticizers, insecticides and fire retardants.
Last year toxicologists in Texas reported finding fluoxetine, the active ingredient in Prozac, in the brain, liver and muscle tissue of fish residing in a municipal effluent-dominated stream. The potential good news is that some algae can degrade some of these emerging contaminants.
Thus, long-term benefits of a Sonoma County program that used wastewater to "grow" biofuels would be environmental (cleaner water and lower carbon dioxide emissions) and economic (providing a reliable local source of fuel that doesn't require entry into foreign lands).
The major difficulty in implementing this vision is not practical but political: algal-based fuels lack a powerful advocate. The city of Santa Rosa has shown foresight on energy issues. Perhaps the current pressure on the city to find ways to dispose of excess treated wastewater can serve as a catalyst for our community to trailblaze the way from oil- to algae-dependence.
Oilgae - Biodiesel from Algae
Oilgae Blog Home
algOS - Biodiesel from Algae Open Source
From The Press Democrat - see oringial link
Algae-based fuel: Transforming wastewater into green gold
By MICHAEL COHEN AND CATHERINE LAURIA
Global warming, war in the Middle East and - closer to home - millions of gallons of excess treated wastewater.
A potential common solution to these disparate problems lies in the capacity of algae to convert wastewater to fuel. Sounds fanciful, but with help from the sun, algae cultivated on our ever-growing supply of wastewater could satisfy our community's demands for fuel that are currently met by imported gasoline and diesel.
Peoples of the future will marvel at our profligacy in dumping treated wastewater into natural waterways. Locally, we have already begun to find utility for this water through agricultural irrigation and by recharging of The Geysers for geothermal energy.
But perhaps its greatest beneficial use to society - as an algal growth medium - has yet to be exploited.Treated wastewater contains levels of nutrients that can support dense algal growth. Using the sun's energy, algae convert carbon dioxide into biomass while removing excess nutrients from the water. Technology to cultivate and harvest large amounts of algae already exists as do the means to extract their lipids and process them into fuels that can power our cars and trucks (fossil fuels are after all mainly derived from dead algae - not dinosaurs).
Facilities for commercial production of algae-based fuels are now a reality: Aquaflow Bionomic Corporation has begun making biodiesel from algae in New Zealand, Biofuel Systems SL will start operations in Spain in 2007 and GreenFuel Technologies has just started a partnership with an energy company in New York.
Algae can also perform another valuable service: breaking down a variety of organic contaminants that survive other wastewater treatment processes.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, 111 out of 139 streams sampled in 1999 and 2000 contained one or more organic wastewater contaminants, including human and veterinary drugs, natural and synthetic hormones, detergent metabolites, plasticizers, insecticides and fire retardants.
Last year toxicologists in Texas reported finding fluoxetine, the active ingredient in Prozac, in the brain, liver and muscle tissue of fish residing in a municipal effluent-dominated stream. The potential good news is that some algae can degrade some of these emerging contaminants.
Thus, long-term benefits of a Sonoma County program that used wastewater to "grow" biofuels would be environmental (cleaner water and lower carbon dioxide emissions) and economic (providing a reliable local source of fuel that doesn't require entry into foreign lands).
The major difficulty in implementing this vision is not practical but political: algal-based fuels lack a powerful advocate. The city of Santa Rosa has shown foresight on energy issues. Perhaps the current pressure on the city to find ways to dispose of excess treated wastewater can serve as a catalyst for our community to trailblaze the way from oil- to algae-dependence.
Oilgae - Biodiesel from Algae
Oilgae Blog Home
algOS - Biodiesel from Algae Open Source
Oilgae.com - Oil & Biodiesel from Algae provides links, provides directory and web links resources for the algae-based biofuels & biodiesel. It is intended to be useful for research, information, inputs, news for buyers, sellers, manufacturers, traders, suppliers, producers, exporters and importers of algal oil and algal fuels. It will make an effort to provide info on biofuel feedstock, algal feedstocks, algae oil info and link, details on fuel from algae, bio-fuel, bio-diesel, bio-fuels, algal oils production and uses, and biofuels trade & market resources, data, statistics such as price, prices, demand-supply for buyer, seller, manufacturer, trader, supplier, exporter and producer
PermaLink - Transforming wastewater into green gold posted by Ecacofonix : 3:44 AM
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Thursday, August 24, 2006
Sunflower Electric - Recycling Waste & By-products
One more example of how gradually traditional power generation companies have started integrating their operations with alternative fuels, including algal oil.
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The planned expansion of the coal-fired generating capacity at Sunflower Electric Power Corp.'s Holcomb complex isn't the only energy project in the works here.
Teaming with the Kansas Bioscience Authority and a Kansas State University body, company officials are moving forward with plans for a series of parallel, on-site facilities that also would generate ethanol, biodiesel and methane. Byproducts would be recycled among the various facilities, boosting production efficiencies and minimizing the amount of unused waste...
"When the cycle is complete, there is no waste," said Sunflower President"...
Individual technologies that would help produce the biofuels would all be combined into one complex - the Sunflower Integrated Bioenergy Center. "If we're able to build this, there'll be people flying in to see how it's done".
Sunflower, which is based in Hays, plans to build three 700-megawatt coal-fired generators adjacent to its existing 360-megawatt plant starting next year. The bioenergy center would consist of an ethanol plant, a biodiesel plant, an algae reactor and an anaerobic digester.
As envisioned in a complex flow chart outlining the plans, waste from one facility would be used to help power another. For instance, flue gas, or combustion exhaust, from the coal-fired generators would be fed into the algae reactor, which would produce the algae oil that would power the biodiesel plant.
Manure, animal fat, paunch and wastewater from area feedlots, packing plants and dairies also would figure heavy in the mix. Fat, more properly known as tallow, would help run the biodiesel plant, while wastewater and manure would be fed into the anaerobic digester, which would generate the methane that would help run the ethanol plant....
...Funding likely would come from the private developers involved. The feds and the Kansas Bioscience Authority, an independent state body that promotes biosciences, could also pitch in.
Work on the first element, probably the ethanol plant, could start as soon as next year....
...The rising price of petroleum on global markets is making such projects more and more feasible and attractive. The presence of feedlots, dairies and related entities, meanwhile, makes southwest Kansas a natural locale for them.
For the full news item see link - http://www.hutchnews.com/news/regional/stories/Sunflower082406.shtml
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Oilgae - Oil from Algae, Oilgae Blog Home, algOS - Open Source Project for Biodiesel from Algae
--
The planned expansion of the coal-fired generating capacity at Sunflower Electric Power Corp.'s Holcomb complex isn't the only energy project in the works here.
Teaming with the Kansas Bioscience Authority and a Kansas State University body, company officials are moving forward with plans for a series of parallel, on-site facilities that also would generate ethanol, biodiesel and methane. Byproducts would be recycled among the various facilities, boosting production efficiencies and minimizing the amount of unused waste...
"When the cycle is complete, there is no waste," said Sunflower President"...
Individual technologies that would help produce the biofuels would all be combined into one complex - the Sunflower Integrated Bioenergy Center. "If we're able to build this, there'll be people flying in to see how it's done".
Sunflower, which is based in Hays, plans to build three 700-megawatt coal-fired generators adjacent to its existing 360-megawatt plant starting next year. The bioenergy center would consist of an ethanol plant, a biodiesel plant, an algae reactor and an anaerobic digester.
As envisioned in a complex flow chart outlining the plans, waste from one facility would be used to help power another. For instance, flue gas, or combustion exhaust, from the coal-fired generators would be fed into the algae reactor, which would produce the algae oil that would power the biodiesel plant.
Manure, animal fat, paunch and wastewater from area feedlots, packing plants and dairies also would figure heavy in the mix. Fat, more properly known as tallow, would help run the biodiesel plant, while wastewater and manure would be fed into the anaerobic digester, which would generate the methane that would help run the ethanol plant....
...Funding likely would come from the private developers involved. The feds and the Kansas Bioscience Authority, an independent state body that promotes biosciences, could also pitch in.
Work on the first element, probably the ethanol plant, could start as soon as next year....
...The rising price of petroleum on global markets is making such projects more and more feasible and attractive. The presence of feedlots, dairies and related entities, meanwhile, makes southwest Kansas a natural locale for them.
For the full news item see link - http://www.hutchnews.com/news/regional/stories/Sunflower082406.shtml
--
--
Oilgae - Oil from Algae, Oilgae Blog Home, algOS - Open Source Project for Biodiesel from Algae
Oilgae.com - Oil & Biodiesel from Algae provides links, provides directory and web links resources for the algae-based biofuels & biodiesel. It is intended to be useful for research, information, inputs, news for buyers, sellers, manufacturers, traders, suppliers, producers, exporters and importers of algal oil and algal fuels. It will make an effort to provide info on biofuel feedstock, algal feedstocks, algae oil info and link, details on fuel from algae, bio-fuel, bio-diesel, bio-fuels, algal oils production and uses, and biofuels trade & market resources, data, statistics such as price, prices, demand-supply for buyer, seller, manufacturer, trader, supplier, exporter and producer
PermaLink - Sunflower Electric - Recycling Waste & By-products posted by Ecacofonix : 9:54 PM
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