Posted on 07/29/2008 5:48:39 AM PDT by Red Badger
Oil prices recently hit $140 per barrel. The cost to grow and transport food is rising in tandem, and the global economy is being squeezed. Meanwhile pollution from burning fossil fuels continues to pollute the planet. The world needs an abundant source of clean, transportable, inexpensive fuel. Could microscopic algae hold a key to that future?
There has been a lot of hype surrounding oil production from algae lately. Visionaries claim algae holds the key to energy independence, but as exciting as oil produced from algae is, the reality is that a fossil-fuel-free economy is probably farther off than many think. That said, read on to find out why algae oil could also have a far brighter role in the future economy than most people might imagine.
“Algae is the ultimate in renewable energy,” says Glen Kertz, president and ceo of Valcent Products. Kertz is a plant biologist currently marketing his patented design for producing fuel from algae.
As it turns out, under the right conditions, many of these microscopic organisms can be very efficient at harnessing the power of the sun to create vegetable oil. They are much more efficient than corn, soybeans or palm trees—sources currently used to produce fuel for vehicles. According to Department of Energy research prepared by the Department of Energy National Renewable Energy Laboratory (nrel), 15,000 gallons of algae oil could theoretically be produced from one acre of land every year. Kertz claims his company is working on a technique that has the potential to produce 100,000 gallons of algae oil a year per acre of land use.
Compare that to soybeans, which yield only about 50 gallons of bio-diesel per acre; corn, which produces 300 gallons of ethanol; sugar cane, which produces 662 gallons of ethanol; or oil palm, which produces 508 gallons.
Plus, algae can be grown on land that is unsuitable for agriculture—completely removing the fuel-food competition that is developing within the corn industry. In fact, some of the ideal locations for growing algae could be in the deserts. Some types of the oil-producing microbes even grow best in salt or brackish water, and others perform most efficiently when fed agricultural waste or sewage.
“The promise is huge, [but] the technical challenges are major,” says Philip Pienkos, a supervisor at nrel. Yet, “just like fusion, the potential for making a cheap source of energy with minimum inherent problems is too great to ignore.”
There are currently two different methods being used to grow and harvest the oil-producing algae, but both of them have hurdles to overcome.
The first technique was studied back in 1978 just after the fuel shocks due to the Arab oil embargo. Using this method, algae are grown in large open-air ponds. Carbon dioxide or other nutrient sources are added to the water (which does not have to be potable), and as the algae grows, it is harvested. From a technical perspective, the disadvantage of this method is that the open-air structure is susceptible to contamination. For example, bacteria from bird droppings could potentially enter the ponds and grow to compete with the oil algae—resulting in a harvest that produces little oil. Open-air structures can also lead to high water evaporation rates. The U.S. Department of Energy studied the open pond method for about 18 years, but in 1996 the feds decided that algae oil could never be economically competitive with fossil fuels, so the research was canned. The price of oil in 1996 was about $20 a barrel. Now with $140 per barrel oil, interest in research has returned.
The Wall Street Journal reports on green algae fuel.The second technique involves growing algae in enclosed hanging plastic sheets in giant greenhouses designed to maximize sunlight exposure and keep contaminants out. The algae oil yield can theoretically be much higher using this method (100,000 gallons per acre per year), but so are the costs involved with building the infrastructure. And currently, scientists haven’t figured out a way to keep the plastic from eventually becoming clogged with algae (click here for video).
Both methods have other advantages. For example, besides producing oil (some algae contain far more than 50 percent oil), other useful products could be captured. The harvested starches could be transformed into ethanol, the proteins could potentially be used as feed stock for fish aquacultures, and the leftover waste could be burned in furnaces to generate another stream of energy.
Algae oil doesn’t produce as much pollution either. Burning algae oil is cleaner than other petroleum products because it doesn’t add to atmospheric CO2 levels. When oil is pumped from the ground and burned, CO2 is released, adding to the total concentration in the atmosphere. But, since algae takes in CO2 from the surface environment (not from deep within the earth where it is locked away) and converts it to oil and other products, no new CO2 enters the system when it is burned.
The niceties involved in oil-from-algae production are readily clear. But despite the fact that algae oil is cleaner than fossil fuels, and is more productive than other alternative fuels, the challenges associated with implementing a national algae-to-oil program would be significant.
With current technology, a lot of land would be required to produce enough algae oil to cover fuel demand.
America, for example, consumes approximately 3.4 billion barrels of gasoline and about 1.5 billion barrels of diesel per year. Since diesel engines are approximately 35 percent more efficient than gasoline engines, America would need roughly 2.21 billion barrels of algae oil to replace gasoline. All told, to replace both gasoline and diesel consumption with algae oil, 3.71 billion barrels of biodiesel (155 billion gallons) would be needed each year.
Therefore, if an acre of land produces 15,000 gallons of oil per year (as was estimated by the nrel, but was never actually reached), the nation would need to dedicate 10.4 million acres (16,250 square miles) to algae oil production. The Southwest’s Mojave Desert is approximately 22,000 square miles.
Turning an area the size of the Mojave into a lake obviously isn’t feasible. The hope is that oil yields will increase as technology advances. If Glen Kertz’s 100,000-gallons-per-acre claim is true and is ever reached, algae oil could become a very useful future energy source.
The cost involved to finance the construction of all the algae-to-oil facilities would also run into the hundreds of billions—even trillions. Then there is all the opposition that would be generated by the oil companies, Russia and the Middle East oil producers (who collectively hold trillions of dollars of U.S. debt) and other self-interest groups.
The fact is, as promising as algae oil might be, it isn’t about to provide any near-term solutions to the world’s energy problems. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t look to the future.
Eventually, a clean, easily transportable and abundant fuel source will be found.
The Bible indicates that there is a future time coming when the world will be free from the problems plaguing society today. That utopian time is called the Millennium. It will be a time of peace, abundance, environmental cleanliness and prosperity. It is exciting to think about what technologies await us in that future world. Who knows what undiscovered and unharnessed aspects of nature wait to be unlocked in that future time?
Will algae oil be one of them? Maybe. After all, it seems reasonable that the God of the universe who created the algae that are 50 percent oil, created them that way for a reason (Isaiah 45:18).
For a glimpse into the scriptures describing this future time of energy abundance, read The Wonderful World Tomorrow—What It Will Be Like, by Herbert W. Armstrong. • Robert Morley’s column appears every Tuesday.
On average, a car is in use for ten years or more, so I think that embrittlement, as well as leakage, might be significant over that timeframe. You are talking about consumption in a fixed location, which is not the same as for private vehicle power.
An auto gasoline tank can be stamped metal, shaped to fit around other components, but a high-pressure (10,000 psi) hydrogen tank will have to be a heavily reinforced cylinder. And what is gained in the lower fuel weight will be given up many times over in the tank weight.
In addition, dispensing a gas is far different from dispensing a liquid. Expansion and compression during fueling wastes a significant amount of energy. And then how do you measure the amount dispensed? Actually, I think that the most practical solution would be tank exchange, which would require every hydrogen car to use a standard tank.
And for this, for the same tank volume you get about 1/3 the hydrogen of gasoline, and far less energy. True, it can be used far more efficiently in a fuel-cell electric car, but I don’t believe the cost will ever make it worthwhile.
Back to butanol. As a “hydrocarbone-like” alcohol, it actually can almost replace gasoline in most current engines, unlike ethanol. It used to be made by fermentation in the Weizmann ABE reaction, which produces acetone, butanol, and ethanol in a 3:6:1 ratio. Weizmann was a chemist before becoming the first Prime Minister of Israel. You can read about it from one of its proponents at Butylfuel LLC, which has developed a modified reaction to maximize butanol yield.
http://www.butanol.com/
Go back to my first response. I do NOT consider hydrogen to be acceptable as a vehicle fuel. I can't be any plainer than that. I don't know why you keep harping on it.
And anecdotal data on the "time frame" for embrittlement. A carbon steel pipeline in the Ruhr Valley has been used to transfer hydrogen FOR ONE HUNDRED YEARS.
And I'm very familiar with the proposed use of fermentation to produce butanol. But, as yet, it is NOT considered a viable commercial approach.
OK, we covered many topics and I missed that point. We do disagree on a few points, but more in terms of degree than opposition. I don’t know that hydrogen can be transported through our current natural gas pipeline network, if only because of capacity - the same BTUs would need several times the volume, which would mean higher pressures and flow rates.
Tell me if I’m wrong, but I think your use of hydrogen gas is as a chemical feedstock rather than as fuel. I just do not believe that its use as fuel (actually, an energy vector) will ever be economically justifiable - unless it leaves the planet!
2/3 of our crude oil consumption becomes transportation fuel, and over 95% of our transportation fuel comes from crude oil, through many billions of dollars worth of infrastructure. I don’t think we can change that very quickly, so I think that the best solutions will have to make use of it. That is why I like the idea of algae culture as a new feedstock - but I also think that butanol is worth investigation.
But I was not - and am not - picking a fight. I have learned from our conversation.
You obviously have a VERY serious problem with reading comprehension. I already SAID that the pipeline network would need to be expanded in capacity. Sheesh.
"Tell me if I’m wrong, but I think your use of hydrogen gas is as a chemical feedstock rather than as fuel."
You're wrong.
"I just do not believe that its use as fuel (actually, an energy vector) will ever be economically justifiable - unless it leaves the planet!"
Well, I didn't believe that oil would cost $140 per barrel, either.
"2/3 of our crude oil consumption becomes transportation fuel, and over 95% of our transportation fuel comes from crude oil, through many billions of dollars worth of infrastructure. I don’t think we can change that very quickly, so I think that the best solutions will have to make use of it."
Which is why ethanol is a good idea "now". It uses much of the existing infrastructure with the shortest lead time of any current alternative, with the possible exception of oil-seed derived diesel.
"That is why I like the idea of algae culture as a new feedstock - but I also think that butanol is worth investigation."
And again, I've already said that for the longer term they are worthy research topics---but they're not available NOW.
I have not said a single word of criticism about you and your manner of expressing yourself, and have confined my remarks to the subject under discussion. You, on the other hand, have been ill-mannered, boorish, and personal in EACH of your responses. I have gleaned a few factual items scattered among your vituperation, but I have learned a lot more about you - and it is not pleasant.
I have been polite, you have been just the opposite. That says a LOT more about you than about me.
Have a nice day.
Tough. I get REALLY TIRED of people who come onto energy threads and post the same tired old talking points.
The blooms of the pea-soup colored algae — so big they've been showing on satellite photos — are toxic to fish and small animals and irritating to humans. The lake once notorious for its pollution is cleaner than ever, yet the algae continues to thrive.
Why not turn it into oil? Isn't it time?
Search key word algae and lots of articles about oil and algae will come up to read.
Animal too big and rare take too much manpower to process.. krill very small and abundant processing can be automated..
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