Can Microalgae Solve Global Fuel and Environmental Challenges?

[OmCheeto]

Also, can their process be adapted to process algae grown by conventional methods? And how do those numbers look?

According to the numbers I ran today, all I need is a 4 foot eave extension algae farm on my house to produce all the algae-oil I'll need for the rest of my life. Has anyone looked into simply turning dehydrated algae slime into a burnable fuel, with no processing? Kind of like a greasy fuel pellet?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

According to the numbers I ran today, all I need is a 4 foot eave extension algae farm on my house to produce all the algae-oil I'll need for the rest of my life.

Then you must live a very energy-frugal lifestyle. Even a generous estimate indicates a yield of less than 200 gallons per year.

Has anyone looked into simply turning dehydrated algae slime into a burnable fuel, with no processing? Kind of like a greasy fuel pellet?

Yes, algae can be burned directly as biomass. There are some applications where this may make sense, but I can tell you that drying the algae is an issue.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Another algae story in the news.

...A number of pilot plants scheduled to come online in the next several months will likely give the most accurate glimpse of algae's future: how much oil it can produce, how soon and whether it will live up to its promise. GreenFuel, one of the oldest names in algae, already operates a pilot plant in Arizona, where it houses algae in large, clear plastic bags. Solix will break ground this summer on a new plant in Colorado, growing algae in what are essentially 325-ft.-long, 1.5-ft.-high freezer pops, suspended vertically in shallow pools; a smaller array, with eight 65-ft.-long bioreactors, has entered production in recent weeks. HR BioPetroleum, which signed a deal with Shell last year to produce biodiesel from algae, is currently building a pilot plant in Hawaii using a "hybrid system"—growth begins in long, clear, horizontal tubes before being dumped into open ponds to multiply further. Blitzing the ponds with algae for a short time has the advantage of rendering species invasion a nonissue, the company says.[Haha, that is one that I figured out as well]

"The jury is out on all of them—nobody has fully demonstrated that their system is going to be affordable and scalable, and be robust in terms of operations and maintenance and the ability to produce a large amount of oil routinely," says Ron Pate, a researcher at Sandia National Laboratories who evaluated algal oil in conjunction with DARPA's jet fuel project last year. "There are a lot of naysayers out there, and that's fine. It's good to be skeptical. But at the same time, I think there's enough promise with algae that it needs to be given a better shot than what's been done in the past."

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/earth/4266137.html?series=19

 

[OmCheeto]

Then you must live a very energy-frugal lifestyle. Even a generous estimate indicates a yield of less than 200 gallons per year.

200 gallons per acre per year?
The lowest estimate to date I've seen has been 5000 gallons.
Am I in the correct thread?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

How many square feet of growing area are we talking about?

A reasonable expectation is to get 5000 gallons per acre-year.

 

[Andre]

Well it is not clear to me. Switchgrass is of course a non-food stock so in one sense it is decoupled from the food supply. But then, as I think you are saying, it also uses some finite amount of land which may/may not be displacing food producing crops. IIRC switch grass doesn't require much in the way of tilled farm land so that is another decoupler.

That's the idea, indeed. Switch grass is the basis of the prairy biotope and part of a food chain, remove it in big quantities and you basically kill the biotope. This also because you remove the main fertilizer, it's own decaying remains.

Therefore land should be use with the most marginal biotopes, like deserts

 

[Andre]

Let's try again for some rough order of magnitude production results.

Check:
http://algaetobioenergy.wordpress.com/

See that the south USA receives about 200-250 w/m2 basic sunlight. According to the article, photosynthesis in algea can take about 10% of that, 20-25 w/m2, converted to chemical latent energy in the biomass. If we assume that 50% of that is oil then we are down to 10 W/m2

According to this one kg of oil is worth some 5 * 10⁷ joules worth of energy, So it would take 5 * 10⁶ seconds to produce the equivalent of that, which is about 6 liters per year per square meter, or about 25000 liters per acre or some 7000 gallon per acre. Indeed not unreasonable.

 

[OmCheeto]

How many square feet of growing area are we talking about?

544 square feet.

A reasonable expectation is to get 5000 gallons per acre-year.

5000 gal/acre * 1 acre/43,560 ft^2 = 0.115 gal/ft^2 yr

544 ft^2 * 0.115 gal/ft^2 yr = 62.4 gallons / yr

Minimum annual driving = 5000 miles

mpg required = 5000 miles/62.4 gallons = ooops! 77.5 mpg

Moped here I come!

I guess by "all the algae-oil I'll need for the rest of my life", I was implying just automotive needs.

hmmm... Increasing the eave to 6ft and getting a higher octane grade of algae(7500gal/yr) yields a requirement of only 32.5 mpg. That looks better.

With clear polycarbonate at $2/ft^2, my 6 ft eave would cost about $3400 with framing and nuts and bolts. With my current gas needs at $1200/yr. That's a payback time of about 3 years.

I hope the base algae oil numbers are correct. I'd hate to invest that money and only get a huge slimy green deck cover...

 

[Andre]

Perhaps check out some European cars:

The Peugeot 308 currently holds the record of the most fuel efficient mainstream car, averaging 3.13 L/100 km (75 mpg–U.S. / 90 mpg–imp) over a distance of 14,580 kilometres (9,060 mi)

57 MPG in my version: Picking it up next week.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

544 square feet.


5000 gal/acre * 1 acre/43,560 ft^2 = 0.115 gal/ft^2 yr

544 ft^2 * 0.115 gal/ft^2 yr = 62.4 gallons / yr

Minimum annual driving = 5000 miles

mpg required = 5000 miles/62.4 gallons = ooops! 77.5 mpg

Moped here I come!

I guess by "all the algae-oil I'll need for the rest of my life", I was implying just automotive needs.

hmmm... Increasing the eave to 6ft and getting a higher octane grade of algae(7500gal/yr) yields a requirement of only 32.5 mpg. That looks better.

With clear polycarbonate at $2/ft^2, my 6 ft eave would cost about $3400 with framing and nuts and bolts. With my current gas needs at $1200/yr. That's a payback time of about 3 years.

I hope the base algae oil numbers are correct. I'd hate to invest that money and only get a huge slimy green deck cover...

Don't forget about a centrifuge, press, and equipment and chemicals needed for the biodiesel reaction. A very small desktop centrifuge sells for about $5000. Then I think the 1 micron perf basket is another couple of thousand dollars. A small desktop press is a little over a grand, but this may be very inefficient at removing the oil, so you have to reduce expectation for the yield accordingly. Then one has to allow for mutations, disease, and invasive strains. One approach here is to constantly provide a fresh charge of algae to the bioreactor, but this requires highly regulated incubators. Also, the bioreactor itself requires the proper amount of light - not too much, not too little - and it must be temperature controlled. Typically, it also requires circulation of the water, aeration, and for accelerated growth [the high yields], an additional source of CO2. One also has to allow for the nutrient requirements - NPK. The algae collection process must be considered. One also has to allow for the energy required to run all of this.

You will need tanks and pumps for, dewatering the oil, the biodiesel conversion process, and storage. Keep in mind that biodiesel has a limited shelf life. You will also need the chemicals needed for the transesterification. So again we have to factor in additional financial and energy costs.

And not to be taken lightly, there is a large mass of de-oiled algae fiber to contend with.

Note also that not all forms of algae produce the triglycerides needed for transesterification, so the strain must be not only a good producer of oil, but also a good producer of the right kind of oil. The fuel quality will vary according the ratio of various fatty acids in the oil from different algae strains. You will also have a byproduct of glycerin, which is saleable, but since the BD craze started, the bottom has fallen out of the glycerin market.

On the up side [generally speaking], I am told by someone "in the know" that you can readily sell all of the oil that you can produce, and for a good price - at that time, last December, it was about $2 a gallon.

 

[wildman]

If Hubbert is right about peak oil occurring very soon (and he has always been right in the past), I would say there is A LOT of money to be made here. I am talking trillions of dollars. With that kind of incentive, these problems should be broken quickly. The problem in the past has always been cheap oil. Why invest in biofuels when oil is essentially free? That looks like it is over or nearly over. Time to make some fortunes, yea Ivan?

 

[PRDan4th]

Hey fellas! I don't think this is something you want to do in your backyard! I have a 7 acre pond that mucks up with algae every summer and causes problems with everything. The cost of a collection and processing plant would be expensive and production is seasonal (Summer only). The stink of drying muck would have your neighbors loving you!

This may be a good idea but should be tied into a good reliable source of CO2 and warm water. A coal fired power plant would be perfect! The cooling pond aerated with flue gas for carbon sequestration and algae growing seems to be the best large plant location. A biofuel plant located on an adjacent site across the pond process the algae into liquid fuels. The residual fiberous waste could be blended with coal and fed to the power plant.

 

[mheslep]

Don't forget about a centrifuge, press,

So Algae requires both? Looking at other BF stocks like soy one only needs a press, apparently.

and equipment and chemicals needed for the biodiesel reaction. A very small desktop centrifuge sells for about $5000. Then I think the 1 micron perf basket is another couple of thousand dollars. A small desktop press is a little over a grand, but this may be very inefficient at removing the oil, so you have to reduce expectation for the yield accordingly. Then one has to allow for mutations, disease, and invasive strains. One approach here is to constantly provide a fresh charge of algae to the bioreactor, but this requires highly regulated incubators. Also, the bioreactor itself requires the proper amount of light - not too much, not too little - and it must be temperature controlled. Typically, it also requires circulation of the water, aeration, and for accelerated growth [the high yields], an additional source of CO2. One also has to allow for the nutrient requirements - NPK. The algae collection process must be considered. One also has to allow for the energy required to run all of this.

You will need tanks and pumps for, dewatering the oil, the biodiesel conversion process, and storage. Keep in mind that biodiesel has a limited shelf life. You will also need the chemicals needed for the transesterification. So again we have to factor in additional financial and energy costs.

And not to be taken lightly, there is a large mass of de-oiled algae fiber to contend with.

Note also that not all forms of algae produce the triglycerides needed for transesterification, so the strain must be not only a good producer of oil, but also a good producer of the right kind of oil. The fuel quality will vary according the ratio of various fatty acids in the oil from different algae strains. You will also have a byproduct of glycerin, which is saleable, but since the BD craze started, the bottom has fallen out of the glycerin market.

Thanks much for this summary! Hopefully now I don't have to plow through the entire Aquatic Species Program report to get the main points.

On the up side [generally speaking], I am told by someone "in the know" that you can readily sell all of the oil that you can produce, and for a good price - at that time, last December, it was about $2 a gallon.

Hmm. Well w/ petrol diesel at $4.5 / gallon why isn't this taking off? I would think farmers especially would be digging in here: they're already big diesel users ($5.8B/year), they have the land available, and their fuel usage would drop off in cold months when algae has problems. Of course much soy diesel is already made but the yield per acre year is comparatively tiny.

 

[mheslep]

Here are the numbers on exactly how tiny in this BD for on farms report, Pg 14 (attached below)
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/PDF/biodiesel_on_farm.pdf

I also note that algae only gets a one page mention in this report.

 

[mheslep]

... and for accelerated growth [the high yields], an additional source of CO2. ...

...This may be a good idea but should be tied into a good reliable source of CO2 and warm water. A coal fired power plant would be perfect! ...

Yes a good CO2 source appears to be one of the more significant problems for small scale algae BF. Another way to look at the Solazyme approach is that it solves that problem by supplying the carbon through the added cellulose. Perhaps this is the big breakthrough that farmers have needed to effectively use algae BF. Previously they didn't have flu gas from a convenient coal plant on every farm. Also, I would think Solazyme approach would allow an enclosed bioreactor since CO2 is not(?) required and the cold weather problem could be solved as well.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Hey fellas! I don't think this is something you want to do in your backyard! I have a 7 acre pond that mucks up with algae every summer and causes problems with everything. The cost of a collection and processing plant would be expensive and production is seasonal (Summer only). The stink of drying muck would have your neighbors loving you!

This may be a good idea but should be tied into a good reliable source of CO2 and warm water. A coal fired power plant would be perfect! The cooling pond aerated with flue gas for carbon sequestration and algae growing seems to be the best large plant location. A biofuel plant located on an adjacent site across the pond process the algae into liquid fuels. The residual fiberous waste could be blended with coal and fed to the power plant.

For the reasons that you mention and based the literature, in my opinion it is well established that open systems are typically not a viable option. Cost effective bioreactors and processing techniques are the essential challenge. Of course, as the price of fuel continues to rise, the field of options continues to expand.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

So Algae requires both? Looking at other BF stocks like soy one only needs a press, apparently.

First the algae has to be separated from the water, which is the difference between processing algae, and something like soy. A centrifuge is usually used for this, but there are other techniques, such as ultrasonic separation.

Thanks much for this summary! Hopefully now I don't have to plow through the entire Aquatic Species Program report to get the main points.

I would say that is more a thumbnail sketch than a summary.

Hmm. Well w/ petrol diesel at $4.5 / gallon why isn't this taking off? I would think farmers especially would be digging in here: they're already big diesel users ($5.8B/year), they have the land available, and their fuel usage would drop off in cold months when algae has problems. Of course much soy diesel is already made but the yield per acre year is comparatively tiny.

Well, back in December I think diesel was selling around here for a little over $3. All in all, I suspect that we are seeing the new gold rush begin... or should I say green rush? But then we are quickly learning that green is gold.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

If Hubbert is right about peak oil occurring very soon (and he has always been right in the past), I would say there is A LOT of money to be made here. I am talking trillions of dollars. With that kind of incentive, these problems should be broken quickly. The problem in the past has always been cheap oil. Why invest in biofuels when oil is essentially free? That looks like it is over or nearly over. Time to make some fortunes, yea Ivan?

I have checked on this, and based on numbers from the DOE for 1998, the wholesale market for fossil fuel power - coal, natural gas, petro - is about 1 trillion dollars per year, with petro accounting for about half of that. So with the price of fuel today, I would think that 1 trillion a year is a minimum and that the real price is approaching 2 trillion.

This is only for the USA. If we factor in China and India...

 

[OmCheeto]

Gulp. Ok. This is not a backyard project. I now estimate a minimum $200,000 investment to be economical.

http://www.bioking.nl/how_to_make_biodiesel.htm
Basically confirmed Ivan's statements that there's more to biodiesel than just squeezing the fat out of the little buggers.

http://www.bioking.nl/index.html
The BioKing-Pro is a High Tec biodiesel production plants that produce fast and easy 12,000 liters (3,170 gallons) per day prime quality biodiesel.

27k euro = $42k

I re-ran the numbers to include 27 of my neighbors and concluded that we could produce enough raw oil in a year to run the BioKing-Pro for about a day. This was with a continuous closed system from one end of the block to the other, covering 37,000 ft^2. (16ft x .44miles)

The return on investment was about 10 years at $5/gal.

Hmmmm... 7600 homes would be required to generate the raw oil for just one BioKing.
Probably be near impossible to get a buy in on that kind of scale.

I wonder if they have a mini-me version.


On another note:

Yes a good CO2 source appears to be one of the more significant problems for small scale algae BF.

Beer is the answer.

Not only am I a total nerd, but I used to make my own beer. Back in April of 1990, I determined that my 5 gallons of beer produced 440 liters of CO2 during the 2 week course of fermentation. Assuming of course that all the gas was CO2.
(graph and raw data available on request)

hmmmm...

Do you think that people with hydrocarbon heated homes will one day be required to pump their effluent back to a central processing station, much like the way we deal with our poo?
This CO2 laden gas could then be pumped through an Algae farm, a la MIT.

Actually, they could just pump it into one of the neighborhood farms. The algae could be collected and piped to a central processing station.

 

[mheslep]

OmCheeto you are a true visionary

 

[OmCheeto]

OmCheeto you are a true visionary

Are you making fun of me or are you serious?

If you are serious then I would advise not encouraging me, as I can imagineer for hours. If you're making fun of me then you should just tell me I'm insane. It's ok. I'm used to it.

Ok. I'll continue my insane visionary rant:

The stink of drying muck would have your neighbors loving you!

I'm a river rat, and have covered my body in live algae. Algae does not stink. The stench was probably due to the algae dying, and bacteria had taken over. Ivan is correct in that this needs to be a closed system.

This may be a good idea but should be tied into a good reliable source of CO2 and warm water. A coal fired power plant would be perfect! The cooling pond aerated with flue gas for carbon sequestration and algae growing seems to be the best large plant location. A biofuel plant located on an adjacent site across the pond process the algae into liquid fuels. The residual fiberous waste could be blended with coal and fed to the power plant.

MIT answered that rhetorical statement.

hmmm... mheslep. Are you a beer drinker?

How much CO2 does algae require to really thrive? (moles per little bugger per second)

Should I put on a mask at night to fuel them?
Should I collect the exhaust gas from my car? (I collected the numbers this morning, but have yet to run the them.)

Is CO2 really a problem? Or is it the solution?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Is CO2 really a problem? Or is it the solution?

It is important to remember that any added CO2 [not ambient] used to grow algae is ultimately released and added to the atmospheric CO2 resevoir when the biodiesel is burned. So, ideally we only want sources that are unavoidable CO2 producers that are not otherwise sequestered or scrubbed. But as you demonstrated, there are many large producers of CO2. And I can tell you that there are some other tricks that might be considered, but for now I'm not talking.

 

[mheslep]

Are you making fun of me or are you serious?

I was applauding your imaginative beer based solution! Wish I had thought of it myself.

 

[mheslep]

Gulp. Ok. This is not a backyard project. I now estimate a minimum $200,000 investment to be economical.

http://www.bioking.nl/how_to_make_biodiesel.htm ...

Another annoying problem for the do it your-selfer, as I just discovered from a friend at EPA: the backyard project is illegal. That is, as soon as you put your 'home brew' in your vehicle and hit the public roads, its illegal. Apparently one needs approval from EPA first, not a trivial pursuit. EPA's contention is burden of proof is on you to first demonstrate that said home brew does not contain some bad juju.

Edit: Same EPA friend tells me the bottom is recently dropping out of the Bio-diesel business (traditional soy, etc based). Why I can only speculate.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What do you mean by the bottom dropping out?

Nearbio.com lists 1599 operating biodiesel stations. Oregon just mandated that all diesel will be a minimum of B5. Washington is all B2.

 

[mheslep]

What do you mean by the bottom dropping out?

Nearbio.com lists 1599 operating biodiesel stations. Oregon just mandated that all diesel will be a minimum of B5. Washington is all B2.

I was told recently that a large chunk of US bio diesel, not ethanol, producers expect to get out of the business soon. I don't know why, maybe soy has become too expensive to raise vs other crops. Maybe its just a consolidation in the industry.

Edit: Yes, looks like displacement by corn ethanol:

U.S. crop producers made dramatic shifts in acreage in 2007. The shifts were motivated by rising corn-based ethanol production and high corn prices, rising wheat prices, and a surplus of soybeans.

The acreage shift was led by a 17 million acre increase in feed grains, including 15.3 million more acres of corn. Winter wheat acreage increased by about 3.1 million and harvested acreage of hay was up by nearly one million acres. These increases were accommodated by an 11.9 million acre decline in soybean plantings,

http://www.ethanolmarket.com/PressReleaseUofIllinois120107

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Given that diesel is pushing $5 a gallon, it is hard to understand why there is a suplus of soy... it may be that there is a shortage of fuel processors.

I guess this could just be a matter of price fluctuations for the farmers. With the worldwide grain shortage, there is certainly pressure to produce grains.

 

[mheslep]

Yes but much more pressure to produce corn esp. with the subsidies. I do not think there is a surplus of soy. If you look at the numbers soy is being directly displaced by corn. So there is plenty of bio diesel demand, but still hard times for soy based bio-diesel as they can't get stock. On the other hand, this is quite an opportunity for alternative, non-soy, bio diesel ventures.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Unless there is a shortage of soy-bio processors, the only things that would make sense to me wrt corn is that that either the subisidies are the problem, or soy is relatively expensive to grow. I would think that a high demand for biodiesel would result in a high demand for soy, which should drive the price up.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

We had a corn farmer comment on this last year in another thread. I will see if I can track him down.