US Scientists Convert Algae to Crude Oil in Less Than an Hour

[eridani]

File under "promising, but needs scaling up"

http://www.nationofchange.org/us-scientists-convert-algae-crude-oil-less-hour-1387812791

U.S. scientists believe they may have cracked one of the great biofuel conundrums. They have turned a thick soup of algae into a mix of crude oil, gas, water and plant nutrients in less than an hour. That is, they have taken 60 minutes to do what Nature does—at great pressures and temperatures—over millions of years.

Better still, the researchers at the U.S. Government’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) believe they have invented a continuous process that is not only faster than the experimental methods pioneered so far for making oil from natural growing things, but cheaper and more self-sustaining.

So far, the PNNL reactor handles only 1.5 litres of algae an hour. But, the team reports in the journal Algal Research, somewhere between 50 percent and 70 percent of the algal carbon is converted to potential energy in the form of crude oil, which in turn can be made into aviation fuel, gasoline or diesel.

The leftovers are clean water, a mix of fuel gases and nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium that can be used to nourish more algae

[Archaic]

1. Those folks at the PNNL work 24x7.

I knew a bunch of people that supported some of their key systems.

They were on the phone 24x7 with people at the lab because there were folks working on projects at all hours.

It was some experimental gear, so it was finicky, but such an improvement over prior systems it was worth the frustration at the time.

If I were incredibly wealthy, it would be fun to go to a bunch of the labs, NASA, and other concentrations of great thinking and buy them lunch. Then, fund the crap out of many of their projects with the expectation that anything I funded became public domain and free to all nations.

Thanks for the story.

[mia]

2. Best news in a long time! Here's the science behind it all...

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211926413000878

The authors acknowledge the support for this research provided by the U.S. Department of Energy through its Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) via the National Alliance for Advanced Biofuels and Bioproducts (NAABB). Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is operated for the U.S. Department of Energy by Battelle under Contract DE-AC06-76RL01830. We gratefully acknowledge the participation of our process licensee, Genifuel Corporation and the other participants in the NAABB (also funded by BETO) who provided the algae feedstocks for our tests.

Thanks to the U.S. Department of Energy!

[progressoid]

3. But aren't we still burning carbon?

[kristopher]

5. Not sequestered carbon; but carbon that is drawn down from the air.

It's what is locked under the ground/water that we want to avoid releasing.

[kristopher]

4. Feedstock algae are by nature up to 70% 'oil' so I'm not sure this is such a major step.

The hook line about what it takes nature a million years to do is sensationalism. I don't object to that so much, after all you have to get a reader's attention, but it also misdirects the focus to an irrelevant part of the research. And that isn't so good.

Here is a link to a low-tech method of growing and processing algae for fuel. It is a simple approach that gives an excellent sense of the nature of the challenges involved that the research in the OP is trying to address.

My one critique of the paper in the OP (and perhaps the process developed) is that it doesn't provide an accounting of energy inputs into their process even though it is clearly energy intensive. That isn't necessarily a deal killer, but it is a very relevant and valuable piece of information to have.

Algae as a Biodiesel Feedstock: A Feasibility Assessment
Submitted by: Center for Microfibrous Materials Manufacturing (CM3) Department of Chemical Engineering Auburn University, Alabama 36849-5127
Ron Putt Principal Investigator [e-mail]
November 20, 2007

http://www.afdc.energy.gov/pdfs/algae.pdf

[cprise]

6. Indeed. Looks kind of gimmicky to me.

There is no big secret to obtaining oil from algae. The secret is in farming it effectively.