Algal Biomass Organisation challenges Report

A published report in Environmental Science and Technology claimed that "conventional crops have lower environmental impacts than algae in energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and water." The Algal Biomass Organization (ABO), the trade association for the algae industry, today challenged the conclusions of the published report.

The report was based upon obsolete data and grossly outdated business models and overlooked tremendous improvements in technology and processes across the production cycle.

Few of the many concerns of ABO about the report are:

Assumptions about algae growth systems

Assumptions about co-location

Assumptions about water use

Assumptions about energy use

Assumptions about purchase of CO2 and fertilizer

Algal Biomass Organization firmly believes life cycle assessments are critical to the development of the industry. Its membership supports the development of robust LCAs, but believes that the process should include input from a multitude of stakeholders, including algae technology companies, NGO’s and other scientists.

More: http://bit.ly/csU6z5

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Jet Fuel from Algae Receives Stimulus

To create green aviation fuels, diesel and gasoline that can be transported and sold using existing fueling infrastructure, the Obama administration is investing up to $78 million of economic stimulus money in biomass technologies, including algae, says Energy Secretary Steven Chu.

Two biofuels consortia - NAABB, the National Alliance for Advanced Biofuels and Bioproducts and NABC, the National Advanced Biofuels Consortium, have been awarded funding to research algae-based fuels as part of the Energy Department’s larger $564 million effort to stimulate the creation of domestic bio-industry.

"This award cements St. Louis as a center for the development of renewable energy from algae," said Dr. Richard Sayre, NAABB chief scientist. Led by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, NREL, based in Golden, Colorado and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, NABC will research infrastructure compatible, biomass-based hydrocarbon fuels.

More: http://bit.ly/a4pf8I

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Bioremediation of Malachite Green by 3 Microalgae

Biological decolorization of the triphenylmethane dye, Malachite Green (MG), by three microalgae, Chlorella, Cosmarium and Euglena species was investigated. Results indicated that the decolorization was dependent on reaction time, initial dye concentration, algal concentration, pH and temperature.

The reusability and efficiency of the algae in long term repetitive operations were also examined. Since all of the algae had reasonable reusability in repetitive decolorization operations, the process seems to be biodegradation.

An artificial neural network (ANN) model was developed to predict the biological decolorization of MG solution. The findings indicated that the ANN provided reasonable predictive performance (R2 = 0.98).

More: http://bit.ly/bFX72D

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Algae Strains engineered at BioCentric Energy

Ms.Domini Maddox, a highly experienced algae specialist has been hired and will be joining the BioCentric Energy team beginning Monday, February 1st, 2010. This algae specialist will be working onsite at the BioCentric Energy headquarters located in Santa Ana, California.

Ms.Maddox has worked on biofuel research projects sponsored by DARPA. Dr.Jerry Brand, the director of UTEX, who is well known and respected in the algae industry, highly recommended Ms.Maddox. UTEX is the principal resource in the algae industry with approximately 2,300 different strains of algae in collection and an extensive library and research facility.

Ms.Maddox will be researching and identifying various strains of algae with high lipid/oil contents for various applications and optimizing and managing the consistent growth of contaminant free algae.

BioCentric Energy announced that the final engineering on the V3 Algae-Pro Photobioreactor system is now complete.

A specific algae strain with high EPA/DHA oil [are the powerful properties making Omega 3 so valuable] content will be grown in BioCentric Energy's V3 Algae-Pro systems and the oil will subsequently be extracted.

More: http://bit.ly/aMt1Be

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Algae Based Carbon Capture

Algae live on a high concentration of carbon dioxide and nitrogen dioxide -- pollutants are released by automobiles, cement plants, breweries, fertilizer plants, steel plants. Using algae for reducing the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is known as algae-based Carbon Capture technology.

The algae production facilities can thus be fed with the exhaust gases from these plants to significantly increase the algal productivity and clean up the air. About 1.8 tons of CO2 are required for producing one ton of algae. A coal power plant produces about 1 ton of CO2 for every MWh of energy produced.

An additional benefit from this technology is that the oil found in algae can be processed into a biodiesel.

Advantages of algae-based carbon capture are discussed namely,

a) high purity of co2 not required
b) simplifies process of flue gas scrubbing
c) microalgae yields high value commercial products that offsets operation cost of process.
d) proposed process is a renewable cycle with minimal negative impacts on environment.

More: http://bit.ly/awve54

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Algae Oil Extraction

A concise powerpoint presentation of the mechanical extraction process of oil from algae. Refer slide [HABEM] - harvested algae biofuel energy model. The presentation speaks of environment enhancing energy - third generation biofuel.

It talks of energy production and environmental protection as one complementary process.

More: http://bit.ly/dCFwSN

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Gene Modification of Algae

Algae has been promoted as a source of bio fuel. What if algae could also be a source for hydrogen? It could change the economics completely.

Ben Hankamer, director of the Solar Biofuels Consortium, is leading an international team experimenting with a new genetically modified algal strain that appears able to make significant amounts of 90 percent pure hydrogen, while also producing oil for biofuel or other purposes. However, they’re genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and currently restricted to the lab.

While algae emit a small amount of hydrogen naturally during photosynthesis, the new strain has been specifically modified to do so at large scale.

More: http://bit.ly/6PB2z

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com

Algae to Electricity - Hydrogen fuel Cells

Researchers at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, are developing ways to generate hydrogen from algae, using photosynthesis, taking energy from the sun.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is also involved. The team is led by Barry Bruce, professor of biochemistry and cellular and molecular biology at UT Knoxville.

The researchers found a type of algae - thermophilic blue green algae, which is normally found in warmer waters, which could produce a steady stream of hydrogen when exposed to light, with a platinum catalyst. The reaction can work at 55 degrees C.

They also found that the temperature was 10 times more efficient as temperature increased.

More: http://bit.ly/atT1ec

Veronica Cassandra
Your Algae friend in Facebook
algae.veronica@gmail.com