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Newest Energy Source — Pond Scum
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Wed Dec 27, 2006 05:22 PM
from the slippery-when-wet dept.
from the slippery-when-wet dept.
An anonymous reader writes to tell us that several start up companies include one from MIT are looking at using (both natural and engineered) algae as source of bio-fuel. Algae grows quickly and absorbs greenhouse gases. From the article: "Soybeans can give you 50 to 60 gallons of oil an acre compared to 75 to 125 gallons for canola, but algae is almost limitless because it grows so fast, so potentially you could get 10,000 gallons per acre."
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even so (Score:3, Funny)
DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-'96 (Score:5, Informative)
U.S. Department of Energy's
Aquatic Species Program:
Biodiesel from Algae
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/legosti/fy98/24190.pdf [nrel.gov]
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:4, Interesting)
Very interesting, thanks!
From a quick scan - "Even with aggressive assumptions about biological productivity, we project costs for biodiesel which are two times higher than current petroleum diesel fuel costs".
If that was in 1998, then at should be very feasible with current petrol costs, especially taking into account the added value of removing CO2 from the atmosphere.
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Informative)
From a quick scan - "Even with aggressive assumptions about biological productivity, we project costs for biodiesel which are two times higher than current petroleum diesel fuel costs".
If that was in 1998, then at should be very feasible with current petrol costs, especially taking into account the added value of removing CO2 from the atmosphere.
Indeed so! The 2006 inflation adjusted price in 1998 was $18 a barrel, last I checked it was three and half times this right now. In fact the average inflation adjusted price over the last 33 years is about double the 1998 price.
If the DOE algae biodiesel cost estimate is correct then it has already been on average a break-even technology for a third of a century.
Both the total world production of oil and the production of oil available for export are peaking about right now. This has been predicted for years: http://www.energybulletin.net/147.html [energybulletin.net] and current studies verify this.
Thus the cost of oil is not likely to experience any significant downward trend from now on, ever.
The original article's production estimates are a bit suspect though. The 20,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre they give as the upper range of production is 47 g/square meter a day. The DOE gives a maximum annual production of 50 g/square meter of algae (not biodiesel) a day.
Still, the technology looks really good.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You've probably gotten banned from moderation. You can get this most commonly by having used your modpoints negatively on a slashdot editor's post.
Once you're banned, you'll never see mod points again.
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:4, Interesting)
Only if you can burn the product in current systems, otherwise you have to factor in the conversion costs. And you have to assume oil prices will still be insane when your production makes it online. I'd bet on oil remaining high for a while personally, not sure how many billions I'd bet though.
> especially taking into account the added value of removing CO2 from the atmosphere.
How moronic do they make Greens these days? Yea that pond scum will absorb a lot of CO2... and release it right back when you burn it for fuel. So it is carbon neutral unless you plan to compact the algae into bricks and bury it. Of course neutral still beats burning dead dinosaurs who fixed their carbon millions of years ago.
Stories like this are why I don't worry about running out of oil or about global warming. Anytime the system begins to get unbalanced it forces a correction through the free market, and it works even faster and better when the government stays the hell out of things and allows nature to take its course. As oil becomes more expensive, potential replacements that used to be discarded as uncompetitive start looking viable. Once one gets established the intense competition that drove the cost of oil production down will make the new thing cheap and plentiful.
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok, so lets say we don't run out of oil. Not only do we not run out of oil but it remains the most economically viable source of energy for some time to come. At what point does the "free market" then solve global warming? Seems to me that an unregulated free market would just keep on polluting until it is too late (or at least really bad).
The only way to keep corporations from destroying the environment is to regulate them. Enforce environmental standards and fine the hell out of corporations when they violate. Sorry, but free markets don't work for everything.
-matthew
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:4, Insightful)
Biodiesel blend (10% biodiesel) can be burned in current cars with no modification, and pure Biodiesel (100%) can be burned in current cars with slight modifications. Newer cars could be built to accept 100% biodiesel with very little additional cost (less than $30).
Furthermore, the current gas stations and infrastructure could still be used.
No. Algal biodiesel is carbon neutral if you burn it, because burning it emits the same amount of carbon as was removed from the atmosphere by growing the algae. Algol biodisel would be carbon negative if you buried it, because that would be taking carbon out of the atmosphere.
We definitely don't have to worry about running out of oil. There are many alternatives which exist and which are practically inexhaustible and which become economical once gasoline is pricier than $4/gallon. $4/gallon would hardly spell the end of civilization. All of this crap about impending doom from oil exhaustion is so silly as not to merit further comment.
However, the market would not correct global warming, because CO2 emission is an externality. In other words, the cost of destruction from carbon emission is not charged to the emitter and therefore is not included in corporate balance sheets. Thus, the market pays no attention to it. In this case, the most appropriate response is a minimal government intervention of replacing income taxes with carbon taxes. By doing so, the gov't would internalize the externality, thereby causing it to be included in corporate balance sheets. At that point, the market would resolve the problem without further intervention.
The investors in algal biodiesel are probably assuming that the government will impose carbon taxes sometime soon. If the government did so, then biodiesel would be much cheaper (it could help coal plants reduce their taxes) and gasoline would be more expensive, thus biodiesel would suddenly become price-competitive.
Parent
Re:Uhhh... (Score:5, Insightful)
You might want to actually read the article you posted in your own link. Free markets do not just fail whenever externalities exist. If that were true, capitalism itself would have failed by now. Negative externalities do tend to create "less socially optimal" situations, but that doesn't mean that market forces can't correct for them, either. I agree, however, that it seems unlikely that corporate enterprise is likely to spontaneously create a solution for global warming.
Parent
Re:Uhhh... (Score:5, Insightful)
What is this "the" free market of which you speak?
All markets are made by laws, and laws are made by governments. There is no "the" free market, any more than there is "the" internal combustion engine. Markets are machines, made by human beings to solve human problems. Laws made by governments are the mechanism by which we define markets. There are no markets in nature; without governments, there are no markets at all.
So to set "the free market" up as being in any way opposed to "Government" is to fundamentally fail to understand the nature of the relationship between the two. All markets are created by governments or quasi-government (i.e. violent) forces. They are shaped by various forms of regulation, including incorporation requirements, insurance requirements, and other things. "Free" markets are more-or-less free of overt governmental price-fixing and other direct political interference of the type Haliburton depends on. But there are many free markets of various types. And all of them depend on laws and therefore government for their existence and operation.
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Funny)
So, what's it like posting from 2028?
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Funny)
This algae idea could grow on me.
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Informative)
Ah, dammit, the Wikipedia page [wikipedia.org] is easier.
Parent
Re:DoE research on biodiesel from algae from '78-' (Score:5, Insightful)
So the price of gasoline in 1998, the year the paper was written, was around $1.25 per gallon. I'll pay $2.50 a gallon for algae fuel anyday.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
They found a use for Pond Scum? (Score:3, Funny)
(Oh yeah, I'm burning for that one!
Re:They found a use for Pond Scum? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Fish tank power for my PC!!! (Score:4, Funny)
Now I can move my fish tank next to my PC, I never have to clean the damned thing, and I have un interupted power source for my computer!
This is the best discovery EVER!
Why not just dry it and burn it? (Score:4, Interesting)
http://www.phoenixmotorcars.com/ [phoenixmotorcars.com]
or these:
http://www.teslamotors.com/ [teslamotors.com]
And everything else. Then you don't have to bugger about expending energy processing it the stuff into biofuels.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
But that completely *buries* my VW diesel Golf which clocks in at nearly $5 / 100 km....
I had absolutely *no* idea how cheaply you could potentially run an electric vehicle... Now to wait until they cost less than $100,000 USD...
Dirty Jobs (Score:5, Interesting)
There was something a bit like this on Dirty Jobs as I remember. It was a research project that took the output of a power plant (a portion of it) and ran it though tubes of algae that would filter it and remove CO2 and grow, then they could burn the algae afterwards. That way they could get the "free" energy (from the sun that the algae was storing) plus is was carbon neutral if implemented on a large scale.
We just have to be careful that while we enslave the algae, they don't know it's happening so they don't start an uprising. I don't want a very thin layer of mad green goo covering everything.
Severe Lack of 4th Dimensional Thinking (Score:4, Insightful)
We are having a failure to think fourth dimensionally here. Time, folks, time! 10K gal. how often?. Yes it might be in the TFA, but that's no reason to omit it from the summary.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
The algae actually produces the fuel as it bores it's way to the center of the earth. Then you have to start over again with a different acre.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Kind of impressive, considering how small a chunk of land that is.
Re:Severe Lack of 4th Dimensional Thinking (Score:4, Interesting)
Anyway, duckweed [wikipedia.org] doubles its biomass in 10 days [wildlife-g...ing.org.uk]. It's one of, if not the fastest growing plant known (which explains why it's such a pest in our backyard pond). However, since algae need not remain on the surface, the water could be agitated to perhaps increase the usable volume in which the algae grows. That probably wouldn't work for duckweed which a) floats very well, and b) has a sort of floating root which would cause problems. But if it grows faster, it might not matter -- assuming it's usable in the first place.
Parent
Uhm..Yield rates. (Score:4, Interesting)
It seems pretty biased to me. No mention of the energy required to run the biodiesel plants. No mention of exactly how long each yield cycle takes. I mean, great, 10k gallons of biodiesel (even up to 20k) per acre.. per how long? It's a measure of time I thought? So why are you giving me these one-dimensional 'rates'. Sounds pretty skim on the details.
And let's talk about acres. I'd rather cover an acre of desert with solar panels than an acre of land in more moderate climates. And now I get led into the question of solar vs. algae. The algae gets its energy from photosynthesis. Great. But can an acre of algae really compete with an acre of the highest efficiency solar cells -- again, over time? Which one wins in the end?
Look, I'm not saying I disagree, I think it's great people are pursuing alternate forms of fuel. But if you're going to write an article and call it news the least you could do is play devil's advocate along side fanboy. Give me some compare and contrast, some pros and cons. That's all I want!
TLF
Re:Uhm..Yield rates. (Score:4, Interesting)
Considering that the algae aren't black and reflect a lot of the sunlight, I would guess the solar cells win. But how about the total cost? You are considering only land cost, if the algae are less efficient, more area will be needed for them. However, algae are self-manufacturing, solar cell must be produced in a factory from a number of different machines and raw materials. And, of course, there is still another factor: solar cells produce electricity that can be used immediately, algae need some sort of processing to generate useful energy.
All in all, I'm pretty sure algae would be cheaper in our current technology level. Certainly more efficient manufacturing processes for solar cells will be developed in the future, but for now I'd be willing to bet that the total cost for generating energy is lower for algae than for solar cells.
Parent
Re:Uhm..Yield rates. (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
A lot more than oil (Score:5, Informative)
There is a great need to increase world-wide carrying capacity without impacting high biodiversity ecosystems such as the Brazilian rainforests or continental shelf fisheries [i-sis.org.uk], and that reduces greenhouse phenomena. There may be an economic option that uses sea water pumped to desert areas powered by the fact that ground level temperatures are much higher than temperatures at high altitudes. Indeed, it would dump greenhouse heat to space for its power while producing biodiesel, electricity, fish, fresh water, salt and real estate -- all in quantities demanded by developed-world populations -- without adding to, and possibly even sequestering, greenhouse gases.
Proposals for solar updraft tower [wikipedia.org]s have typically assumed that they would be single use structures: solar to electricity via heat differentials between high altitude air and ground level greenhouse-enclosed air. The resulting system has marginal economic value.
Something which would further enhance the value of the solar updraft tower power structure is to use the greenhouse area for algae ponds to add biodiesel, water, fish and salt production to the production of electricity normally envisioned.
Doing so brings the proposal from marginally viable to viable, with a net present value, primarily from live fish production, of $3.5 billion per system, thereby allowing for far higher capitalization and/or return on investment.
Let's start with just the value of algae biodiesel:
The greenhouse area required per solar updraft tower of [wired.com] is huge:
(pi * (5km/2)^2) ? hectares
= 1963.49 hectares
producing peak at peak 200MW via a 1km tall tower.
We now add to this the production of algae biodiesel:
The UNH estimate [unh.edu] for algae biodiesel production is 1 quad per 200,000 hectares. Let's assume only half of the area of the solar updraft tower greenhouse would be available for production at any time (the other half would be used for ponds that buffered heat for the inner ponds, produce fish, provide additional evaporative surface for desalination and provide recreation for residential areas at the outer rim).
That gives us:
(1963.49/2)hectares/tower;200000hectares/quad ? towers/quad
= 203.719 towers/quad
Or about 200 towers per quad of biodiesel.
We can now calculate the biodiesel per tower:
7.2gallon/1e6btu;200tower/quad ? gallon/tower
= 3.5998E+07 gallon/tower
or about 35M gallons of biodiesel per year per tower.
At $2/gallon for wholesale diesel, this yields $70M biodiesel revenue per year.
Now for electrical revenue:
At an average rate of sold production only 1/2 (100MW) of peak capacity (200MW), electrical production per tower per year, is:
100MW;year ? GWh
= 876 GWh
At $30/MWh wholesale [doe.gov]:
100MW;year;30$/MWh ? $
= 2.628E+07 $
or about $25M electrical revenue per year.
Interestingly, the biodiesel revenue is nearly 3 times the electrical revenue of a solar updraft tower!
200*200MW or 40GW electrical peak capacity is produced per quad of biodiesel.
Further that same UNH document estimates 19 quads to replace all transportation fuel in the US or 3800 towers, which would also produce 3800*200MW or 760GW or .76TW of electricity.
Current winter capacity in the US i [doe.gov]
Already doing it (Score:3, Interesting)
Surprising numbers (Score:5, Interesting)
Water could be the limiting factor (Score:4, Insightful)
The Saudi Arabia of algae? (Score:4, Informative)
It might also be possible to put your facilities onto floating platforms offshore. There's lots of possibilities.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You can irrigate it with sea water once. When the water evaporates leaving the salts behind, you are in a bit of a pickle.
Even with "fresh" water irrigation the accumulation of salts is going to be a very real issue.
Another poster suggested growing the algae "indoors" to recycle the water. While this may solve the salt accumulation issue, it does dramatically increase the start-up costs.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Still depends on fossil fuels (Score:3, Interesting)
So where are the oil companies? (Score:5, Insightful)
My question is: where are the big oil companies? Why aren't they buying up huge tracts of land in southern Texas and Mexico and digging huge ponds? Why aren't the hiring algae biologists by the thousands? Building proof test algae refineries? Seems to me that if this were such a great idea ExxonMobil etc would be all over it like flies on algae (so to speak).
Perhaps they are and it is all being kept secret. But as far as I can tell every article/web post/discussion of this process traces back to a single paper by a single biology professor with some basic input/output calculations and not much else. Which makes me a bit suspicious.
sPh
supply/demand (Score:3, Interesting)
*yawn* (Score:4, Insightful)
The real problems aren't a matter of finding something else we can burn, it's a matter of creating a supply chain and infrastructure to rival that of petroleum in terms of quantity, price, availability and reliability, and then of maintaining that long enough for our dumb-ass auto companies to produce decent vehicles which make use of the new fuel, in the styles and manner that will persuade consumers to buy and drive them. In other words, the real problem isn't scientific, it's a matter of economics, logistics, and public policy.
Wake me when someone solves *that* one.
I love this topic, however... (Score:4, Funny)
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/05/1 2/0215234/ [slashdot.org]
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/1 1/1718256/ [slashdot.org]
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/05/ 29/2241247/ [slashdot.org]
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/2 5/1838201/ [slashdot.org]
and
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/02/2 2/0810225/ [slashdot.org]
The real Algae story (Score:4, Informative)
Oil from Algae has great potential. Contrary to what one poster said, there are strains of algae that produce a very large amount of oil. Up to 70% of the dry weight, but more likely around 40%. My favorite algae is Botryococcus braunii [wikipedia.org] because it creates Alkanes, which can be used directly as fuel or transformed into the chemical equivalent of the petroleum fuels we know and love - i.e. Octane, Kerosene, etc. This happens without the inefficiency inherent in the production of biodiesel.
It is true that the carbon so sequestered is again released into the atmosphere. This is unfortunate, but not as much of a problem as it seems at first glance. While the 'low hanging fruit' in terms of surplus CO2 is such industrial processes as fermenting of wine and coal-fired power plants, the secondary source of CO2 can be from everyday air - or air that's not as good as everyday, such as that in polluted cities. There is also the potential of creating an algae bioreactor inside an automobile's exhaust system. That's pretty far off in the future with what we've got right now, but possible.
The current state of the industry in algal fuel oil production is one of confusion. There are snake-oil salesmen (no pun intended) making wild claims about their proprietary, secret systems which are incredible (in the bad meaning of the word). These do not stand up to scientific scrutiny but seem to make headlines and sucker in some angel capital (or at least try to). Not all startups are frauds, however. There is some good progress being made by companies like Greenfuels Technologies. But there is a spectre haunting the market: the ghost of the coal-sands projects of the 1970s which spent billions of dollars without producing tangible returns. These were canceled during the Reagan era when gasoline became cheap again. People seem to have short memories. What would happen a company which produces these expensive fuels if the bottom drops out of the petroleum market? They'd quickly go bust. This is because there is not yet enough government incentives making it possible to compete with temporarily cheap petroleum. What is needed is thoughtful, large scale action by major governments around the world to develop the best alternative energy systems, be they wind, biofuels, even nuclear. For instance, the first thing needed is a moratorium on transportation fuel taxes, guaranteed for a period of time - say ten years. This means not only the removal of federal taxes on these fuels, but the prohibition of state and local taxes on them. Next, there needs to be encouragement for distribution of alternative fuels, such as local licensing boards requiring a certain proportion of fuel pumps to be alternative. There needs to be pressure put on the operators of large fleets of vehicles to utilize the fuels and vehicles for them, and incentives to make their refueling depots available for use by the public.
I could go into some of the technical details regarding the ideas I have on how to make various fuels in an economically viable manner. However, Slashdot isn't the place to go on at (even further) length. If you're interested in this type of stuff, there are several forums, such as Bio-Diesel Now [biodieselnow.com], which I post on and encourage others to get involved with as well. Even so, as much as I'd like my ideas to be adopted, I'd also like some money for my inventions, so I am holding some thoughts back until I meet the right people to work with.
It's a shame that GreenFuels Technologies is right in the middle of the type of things I'd like to do in the algal fuels industry, and their offices are in the same city as me, but they seem to have no use for a computer techie as myself who would like to try his hand at a new industry (my inquiries about jo
Re:another bio-craps (Score:5, Informative)
Why don't they look at how to make liquified coal cheaper and better?
Firstly, "they" are of course looking at that. The fact that some scientists work on biodiesel does not mean that nobody is looking at liquified coal.
Secondly, liquified coal doesn't do anything towards solving the CO2 problem, so biodiesel should always be preferable.
Parent
Fossil Fuel: MILLIONS of years. Biodiesel: MONTHS (Score:3, Insightful)
Burning fossil fuels creates
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Look to salt water (Score:5, Informative)
Yes. The fastest-growing and oiliest algae are diatoms, which are saltwater microscopic organisms.
One of the major advantages of biofuel from algae, is that it grows quickly in saltwater ponds in hot areas like New Mexico. As a result, no fresh water or farmland is wasted. Also the land wasn't being used for anything else. Also, algal fuel is carbon-neutral (it sucks up as much CO2 as is released by burning it) so it doesn't contribute to global warming.
Parent
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