Biotech breakthrough claim: commercial algae fuel now possible

[Tac]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110227/ap_on_bi_ge/us_growing_fuel

snippets:

"Joule Unlimited has invented a genetically-engineered organism that it says simply secretes diesel fuel or ethanol wherever it finds sunlight, water and carbon dioxide."

"Joule claims, for instance, that its cyanobacterium can produce 15,000 gallons of diesel full per acre annually, over four times more than the most efficient algal process for making fuel. And they say they can do it at $30 a barrel."

[PFactorDave]

If this is true, it could be a game changer.

[F22RaptorDude]

If this is true, it could be a game changer.

Gotta be hopeful for the future....

[gyrene81]

And they say they can do it at $30 a barrel."

until they realize they have the consumber by the testicles and can charge $100+ per barrel...

[saggs]

Not sure that this is such a "breakthrough".

I remember reading about biofuels from algae at least 10-12 years ago.  Problem then, and now (unless they have made humongous strides) is that it takes a HUGE amount of water acreage to make a small amount of fuel.  

There is just not that many places where company can set up a couple hundred million acres of algae ponds.  You'd need someplace with lots of flat land, and perfect climate conditions, to hot the ponds evaporate in summer, to cold they freeze in winter.

EDIT: just read where they are claiming 15,000 gallons of diesel per acre per year.  That is a big improvement over previous algae attempts if it's true.

Now my question is why don't we have more diesel powered cars in the US.  In Europe you can get a 45mpg diesel full size Jaguar.  In the US about the only diesels available are the Volkswagon TDI or BMW's.  I had a cousin who drove a Ford Focus diesel in the UK getting 60+ mpg, I cannot conceive why Ford won't sell that option here, and put the silly Prius to shame.

[Tac]

Not sure that this is such a "breakthrough".

I remember reading about biofuels from algae at least 10-12 years ago.  Problem then, and now (unless they have made humongous strides) is that it takes a HUGE amount of water acreage to make a small amount of fuel.  

There is just not that many places where company can set up a couple hundred million acres of algae ponds.  You'd need someplace with lots of flat land, and perfect climate conditions, to hot the ponds evaporate in summer, to cold they freeze in winter.

shreck they can do it all in florida. whole damn place is nothing but flat land, hot temperatures, 95% humidity and full of swamps. XD

As for the amount of land needed.. hmm.. thing is this breakthrough is that it doesn't consume the biomass to produce the fuel..the biomass itself secretes the fuel and does so constantly.

15000 gallons per acre per year.. is 1250 gallons per month. And thats their initial amount, no doubt if its viable there will be advances in squeezing a lot more fuel per acre.

Read the article

[saggs]

shreck they can do it all in florida. whole damn place is nothing but flat land, hot temperatures, 95% humidity and full of swamps. XD

As for the amount of land needed.. hmm.. thing is this breakthrough is that it doesn't consume the biomass to produce the fuel..the biomass itself secretes the fuel and does so constantly.

15000 gallons per acre per year.. is 1250 gallons per month. And thats their initial amount, no doubt if its viable there will be advances in squeezing a lot more fuel per acre.

Read the article

I was editing my post to reflect that as you wrote. And don't call me shreck.   

[Tac]

*points at the censorship bot*

i type h eck it posts shreck.   

[MrRiplEy[H]]

We have naturally occurring algae in the thousands of lakes we have. Too bad producing oil in them would be an environmental disaster of a massive scale.

[CAP1]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110227/ap_on_bi_ge/us_growing_fuel

snippets:

"Joule Unlimited has invented a genetically-engineered organism that it says simply secretes diesel fuel or ethanol wherever it finds sunlight, water and carbon dioxide."

"Joule claims, for instance, that its cyanobacterium can produce 15,000 gallons of diesel full per acre annually, over four times more than the most efficient algal process for making fuel. And they say they can do it at $30 a barrel."

this would explain the push to tax co2.............

[kotrenin]

Let's see if I'm doing this right...

15000 gallons per acre per year.

640 acres per square mile.  <---( I live in the city so an acre is lost on me as far as a unit of measure is concerned.)

So 9,600,000 gallons of fuel per square mile per year. 
Or  228,571 barrels per square mile per year.

According to CIA.gov https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2174rank.html the US consumes 18,690,000 (bbl/day) as estimated in 2009.
6,821,850,000 barrels per year.

10% of that would be 682,185,000 barrels. Divide that by 228,571 barrels per square mile/year = 2,985 square miles to produce 10% our yearly oil consumption. (I picked 10% because it is round, it is significant, it is feasible, and it is easy to multiply and divide by 10 .)

The state of Delaware is 1954 square miles.  So we would need an area roughly 1 1/2 times the size of Delaware to support 10% of the yearly US oil consumption.


Possible?

 

[Tac]

The method of production will likely be increased once the system is up and running. From the article they are using solar-panel like setups to give the bacteria its sunlight...

and we know from other algae-fuel efforts that if they use a tower-grid setup they can exponentially increase the surface area exposed to sunlight where the algae can grow.

laymans terms they can put several 'layers' of the algae in the same 1 acre.. a 10 story building setup would mean 10 layers.. aka production is up 10X  per acre.

[Strip]

According to a fairly good source 406.4 million acres (or 635,040 square miles) were used for farming purposes in 2007. For the sake of the argument lets look at what it take to produce 100% of the United States oil need for a year.

At 6,821,850,000 barrels of year you would need 29,845 square miles of fuel producing farmland. At 100% production that would still only represent around 4.7% of the annual farmland production total. Granted there is a lot more involve, most  importantly that a lot of crude oil is used for other purposes. Certainly many of them not capable of using diesel or ethanol but think of what the price of crude oil would do.

If you offset the major uses, like fuel for automobiles, the cost per barrel of regular crude oil would plummet.

I truly hope we see the benefits this in the next five years....

Strip

[Skuzzy]

You are thinking in a single plane format.  Try seeing the algae farm as a multi-floor building (i.e. the vertical farm concept).

[moot]

http://www.springerlink.com/content/j1414q2u5w25h788/fulltext.html
Theoretical calculations.  It doesn't read like they actually have the genetically engineered cyanobacteria they base all the calcs on

We calculate efficiencies for this direct, continuous solar process based on common boundary conditions, empirical measurements and validated assumptions wherein genetically engineered cyanobacteria convert industrially sourced, high-concentration CO2 into secreted, fungible hydrocarbon products in a continuous process. These innovations are projected to operate at areal productivities far exceeding those based on accumulation and refining of plant or algal biomass or on prior assumptions of photosynthetic productivity. This concept, currently enabled for production of ethanol and alkane diesel fuel molecules, and operating at pilot scale, establishes a new paradigm for high productivity manufacturing of nonfossil-derived fuels and chemicals.
[...]
 It is clear from this and other recent analyses focused on life cycles and energy balances (Stephens et al. 2010) that a very compelling case can be made for photosynthesis as a platform technology for renewable production of fuels. More specifically, an engineered cyanobacterial organism for direct continuous conversion of CO2 into infrastructure-compatible, secreted fuel molecules surpasses the productivities of alternatives that rely on the growth of biomass for downstream conversion into product.

I didn't slowly read thru everything, but the rest of the report looks the same. Theoretical calculations.