Conference on Algal Biofuels Sounds Interesting, But….
If I weren’t so frugal with both my money and my time, I’d probably go to this conference on biofuels. I’m curious to know how far this subject has come.
It’s good that the focus is still on algae; if there is a path towards full-scale commercialization of biofuels, which I doubt, algae is the only conceivable way to make this happen, given that it has 30 – 50 time more gravimetric energy density than any terrestrial plant, and that it can grown on non-arable plant with fresh or salt water.
The entire discipline of biofuels has bedeviled bio-energetic scientists since the subject started to intensify a couple of decades ago. The successes they’ve celebrated in laboratory settings have consistently led to disappointment in the field. My theory is that the subject is doomed to failure because the whole enterprise is an attempt to defy nature and the theory of evolution. Life forms evolved to store precisely the energy they need to survive, grow, and reproduce; they did not evolve to store energy they don’t need, just so human beings could come along, harvest it, and put in in our gas tanks.
If this conference were local, I’d be there, for sure. But Ottawa? Sorry.
As a species, we do a fairly good job of cultivating and harvesting grain energy to distribute as food. In your estimation, what are the core technical factors are that currently prevent the scale up of algae fuel production?
Cameron,
You asked this of Craig, but I’ll be happy to take a stab at it.
The technical factors that cause the greatest problems…
First, you have water. Many people have proposed large pools in the desert, but that means pumping lots of water into large pools in the desert, which would quickly evaporate, requiring more water being pumped into the desert. That is more costly than you’d think.
Then there’s filtration. If you’ve ever dealt with a swimming pool or an aquarium, you know the joy of having to deal with runaway algae issues. What most people don’t realize, however, is how very little actual mass of algae it takes to achieve that grotesque green color for your pool. Filtering out the algae from a 15,000 gallon pool that was overrun might only net you a few hundred grams of dried algae, which would then need to be processed into a very contaminated “green oil”, that would then need to be refined.
But the filtration issue is crucial, because if you don’t filter quickly, then the algae loads up and begins blocking sunlight, so you don’t have new algae production, you have new algae having a lack of sunlight due to the floating dead algae.
There’s also the matter of balancing sunlight: too much, the algae is killed, too little, and photosynthesis shuts down. Anything below ~3-4 inches in depth has no hope of actual growth and multiplication. Deeper pools have an advantage in that it’s not as difficult to balance salts and nutrients, but it takes far more energy to filter out the algae. Shallow pools evaporate quickly, and maintaining ideal concentrations of nutrients and salts becomes a challenge, with conditions quickly poisoning the algae during the high sun.
The above was enough of a challenge that many groups started switching to glass or clear plastic tubing that circulated and agitated the 4″ diameter flow of water through the sun, but of course those of us that have had the challenge of an aquarium know how easy it is for algae to stick to glass or clear plastic. Those miles and miles of tubes would need to be cleaned, the cleaning of the tubes would scratch the glass and lower the efficiency of the already poor efficiency of energy absorption, the tubing means you have a low portion of the land devoted to energy conversion, and of course now the costs have multiplied by 3 orders of magnitude compared to the pools…
No-one has gotten photosynthetic algae-oil for less than ~$5000/gallon. I doubt that will change anytime soon.
Glenn,
Well said, very well said!
Thank you Marcopolo.
I’m always a bit startled when we agree on something, but I appreciate it when it happens.
🙂
Thanks for the info, Glenn – much appreciated.