[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Algae based Biodiesel? (Page 1 of 2)
Posted: 2/14/2008 7:36:17 AM EDT
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For the few people who don’t know, biodiesel is a diesel fuel based on vegetable oil. It supposedly works just fine in diesel engines. However it takes a lot of land to produce the vegetable oil and there’s no practical way to grow enough corn (or other oil producing crops) to even begin to meet our needs. But some strains of algae grow very fast and produce a whole lot of oil. We easily have enough open land to meet our fuel needs by growing vegetable oil producing algae in ponds… But there are problems with this too. All that water ends up evaporating so it has to be replaced. Someone calculated that it would take the flow of a major river to supply the necessary algae ponds. There are other problems involving contamination of the algae crops. It’s theoretically possible, but not practical. But now a company claims to have solved these problems. They are growing the algae vertically in a series of plastic pipes. There is no evaporation so water isn’t an issue. The system uses the available sunlight more efficiently so crop yields supposedly go way up. The company is claiming this system can potentially produce 150,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre per year. Even if they are vastly overestimating the yields it would still probably be economically viable. The system also solves the contamination problem It looks good to me but I don’t know what the power requirements of the pumps would be or how much it would cost to build a system like this. There are also probably some other problems I’m overlooking. The video explains things better than I can... Any thoughts from the hive mind? www.valcent.net/i/misc/Vertigro/index.html www.valcent.net/s/Ecotech.asp?ReportID=182039 |
Sell it as hand cleaner, garden fertilizer or sell it to water treatment plants - it promotes the growth of good bugs. Easy problem to have. Hope this algae solution come to fruition - biodiesel is an excellent fuel. Merlin |
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It's promising technology. There is another company doing it in CO. findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4190/is_20070427/ai_n19052229 Somebody needs to tell John McCain to make this the centerpiece of his campaign, right along side "build a wall" In fact, we should build the wall out of Algae tanks. Seriously though, We need to give alternative energy the same Federal priority as the Manhatton Project, and the Apollo program. This is something that appeals to those of us who hate the ROP, and it appeals to those who worry about their "carbon footprint" Politically, it's a win-win, and the Democrats are going to co-opt it if the Republicans don't seize the opportunity. |
| Brilliant idea. Diesel is inherently more efficient in terms of chemical potential energy than gasoline or ethanol. Corn is just about the shittiest product to make any biofuel from because it's yields the lowest amount of fuel per acre. Eliminate farm subsidies and let the market work its magic. |
From Wiki page on Glycerin/Glycerol
How about use it to bring down the price of ammo? I'd love to see this algea thing take off. |
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I heard about this a while ago and thought it was a good idea. You locate the algae farm near a big producer of C02 like a factory or traditional power plant, pipe the exhaust through the algae, which sucks out the C02. This cleans the air and makes the algae grow really fast. Then you harvest the algae, rinse and repeat. Sounds ducky to me. The only issue is whether it works on a large enough scale to be practical, and if the corn lobby and their purchased legislators will kill it. |
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As you could probably guess from my other postings, I think this is a great idea. In fact, I would propose that the US Government, DoD in particular, purchase this fuel as their standard for domestic, non-tactical fuel. It would also be great for the Navy since it is biodegradable in case of a spill. That would lend economies of scale to the technology. |
The Air Force and Boeing are taking the lead on making bio fuels qualified for AF aircraft. There are some problems, one of which is that biodiesel gels at higher temps than JP-8 etc. Plus, refining dino diesel on a large scale is well known, bio, not nearly as much. Merlin |
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Algae is a great idea. There is a project going on using Algae as a natural CO2 scrubber for coal fired power plants. You pump the flume gas into vats of algae; the algae eats the CO2 and grows. Bi-products of this natural CO2 scrubber could be bio-diesel, ethanol, and a protein base for livestock feed and human foods. |
Algae grown in vats at a power plant uses 0 farmland. According to the history channel segemnt on this technology, most power plants have enough land to midigate their CO2 emissions to near zero. I don't know if there would be enough land to grow enough algae to run our cars however. If we would get off the ethanol bullshit and covert over to butanol farmland wouldn't be a problem. Any form of bio-waste could be converted into butanol using 1920s technology. |
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I've been contemplateing doing just this kind of thing to produce heating oil for one of my mom's properties. My idea includes using solar power for just about every aspect of production. Two major problems are obtaining Lye or Potash and Methanol. I really want to try to produce everything necessary, but I'm not sure how to make Methanol from wood---I know it is posssible, and I wonder if some sort of woody crop could be used for this. The Lye or Potash will be something that I will have to buy. Then there is the problem with what to do with the glycerine that is the major by-product. Can glycerine be burned in a stove, to get more heat ? ? ? |
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The biggest issue with any sort of alternative fuel should be the replacement of, but the supplement to, traditional ground-extracted petroleum. I've read studies that suggest introduces someting on the order 5-10% non-traditional petroleum (biofuels, etc) has a moderating effect on oil price fluctuations of 20%. Taking some of the volatility out of the market, and making pricing somewhat more rational (does every carjacking in Lagos need to drive the price of crude?) has the benefit of taking some of the risk out of somewhat more mainstream alternatives (coal gasification and shale oils) thus making their exploitation more likely. |
I think this is the wrong way to look at the problem. Nothing is going to be a 100% solution to the problem - not ethanol, not methanol, not coal gassification, not algae, biodiesel, solar, or any other single source. They're all just pieces of the puzzle. -K |
I believe that congress was trying to kill some of those programs because .gov agiencies aren't allowed to use an alternative fuel that produces more CO2 emmisions than traditional fuel. I don't remember exactly what it was, but it had to do with emmissions being greater with some of the newer fuels than with traditional ones. I'll see if I can find more info. -K |
Yep. Just replacing 25% of our current fuel use with bio will greatly impact the market. I run B20 almost exclusivly in my truck, and right now my auxillary tank has 60 gallons of a B50 blend in it. my truck runs quieter, I don't have any loss of power or mileage, and the added lubricity of B20 over the ULSD means my injection pump and injectors will last loner. |
Yes, they’ve done the math. Vat grown algae doesn’t need farmland, it just needs space. That means any vacant desert land would work. Since the actual practical yield is unknown it’s impossible to really say how much land would be needed. It’s a lot though but it’s not so much that it’s unworkable by any means. If, for example, you assume that the actual yield minus energy used to keep the system running would be 20,000 gallons per acre per year. (Much lower than the 150,000 claimed) and if you assume that a person will use 1,000 gallons a year (including the amount used to manufacture and transport all the goods he needs to live) you can support 20 people on 1 acre of land. That means we need to use 15,000,000 of land to meet our fuel needs and that’s just under 24,000 square miles of land. That sounds like a lot but it’s only an area about 155 miles square. We easily have enough vacant desert land to make it work… Ironically the big problem seems to be that we don’t have enough CO2. Grown in sealed vats the algae would consume all the CO2 in the water very quickly. Pumping exhaust from coal fired plants into the water will only help so much. I don’t know how fast water absorbs CO2 from the air at 300+ PPM so normal aeration might not work. And aerating the water reintroduces the evaporation and contamination problems… |
Just growing it externally, not worrying about evaporation or anything, early estimates show it would take about 15,000sq mi to replace all transportation fuel in the country with algal biodiesel. For comparison, that's about the size of the state of Maryland... a very small chunk of land compared to land in use for farming right now. |
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According to Valcent's video, %10 of the land mass of NM converted to algae production could meet the US energy needs. That's a pretty bold statement, that would be roughly 7.8 million acres. If each plant was 100 acres, 78,000 plants. Obviously it's doable and larger area production plants would be required as 100 acres is small in the grand scheme of things. Flipside is if you were to get too many large plants, they would be subject to natural disasters. One thing that is interesting is that they claim they can taylor the species of algae for they type of fuel required, genetic modification could probably even further enhance that. Far better production yeilds than field crops. The construction of their reactors is pretty damn low cost as compared to other fuel production methods. Basically pumps, tanks and heat welded plastic bag kinda like the air-pak stuff they use for packing material. In addition, I think there could be a significant benefit from such a system since large citys have a surplus of nitrate laiden waste & storm water to treat along side the C02 emissions from power plants & industrial processes. Large lifestock farms have waste water to treat, grain farms have runoff contaminated with nitrates and you could probably even operate a system in coastal regions on salt water if a similar saltwater algae could be taylored to produce optimum fuel grade oils. I've been looking at Valcent, halfway thought about buying some stock at .73 a share but for it to go anywhere, they'd have to have some serious .gov backing. I'd say it's viable. THe U.S. ought to at least explore it as it would be an optimum technology for the desert in the middle east and if they choose to exploit the technology, we'll still be dependant on the MI for our energy needs which solves nothing in the long term. |
I looked at their website and their vertical growing system for crops looks interesting-20 times the crop production, can be used in nonarable land, uses less water. If for nothing else, you can have a huge home garden in the middle of a city. ETA-Plus the system looks prime for automated harvesting. |
Couple it with a methane digester, plenty of co2 produced. |
Anhydrous ethanol can be used. |
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The one thing about ethanol blended fuels at the moment is it's posing a major headaches for many engine manufactuers, especially small engine manufacturers in the way of phase seperation problems. Water readily mixes with E85 (%15 ethanol) and more than .5% water causes phase seperation. Not to mention engine performance issues. Auto manufacturers can compensate with their computer engine controls but small engine technology isn't there just yet. The Germans had a good bit of diesel technology during WW2, they even had engines that ran on coal dust. Be curious to see if they can find an algea that can produce an oil that can be refined into synthetic gasoline. |
This is what I'd like to see more than anything. With the Valcent system, you could definately challenge Big Oil of they didn't decide to exploit the technology themselves. |
Big oil & Big gov. |
No, if it really works, it doesn't need subsidies, and nothing the corn lobby can do will prevent it from happening. If it works, that is. If it works. Private investment will make it happen. ETA: by "works" I mean it is cheaper and more efficient than regular diesel production. I didn't mean to imply that the technology didn't work. |
Didn't Virgin Atlantic just complete a test flight of a 747 using biofuel? I imagine that it was only one or two engines powered with biofuel, but still... |
All the engines use the same fuel system. I know that South African is busy switching to an alternative fuel (NFI) and the USAF completed a Transcon in a C-17 on alternative fuel (NFI) |
Algae tested as fuel for Arizona power plant
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It was a total publicity stunt. |
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the key is making large amounts in many different areas across the country. the more places we have producing biodiesel, the cheaper it will be. i think that renewable fuels are the best thing we can be doing right now. as mentioned earlier, it weens us off the ROP teet AND it's something both the conservatives and liberals can agree on |
An airline and trucking lobby would have a lot of mojo to get this done. 
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You'd have to get past the corn people, the oil companies, OPEC, and maybe the auto industry. Owie. |
The best thing we can hope for is that algal biodiesel (or some thing) can be had at a reasonable price, and the other lobbies will have priced themselves out of the market. I know, wishful thinking. |
This problem was just recently fixed by some firm in Cali. Richad branson just used some aviation grade bio-fuel made from some sort of South American nut to fly his air-bus to the states. He was using a 20% blend but it can go up to 40%. We need to reduce teh farm subsidies a lot. If we bought Cuban sugarcane, we could start dismanteling Castro's regime pretty quickly by buying off their top people. |
We are in the age of genetic manipulation. If they can't find one, they'll make one  (Or, at least, tamper with an existing one until it has the needed properties) |