Aquaflow Strikes Oil with “Green Crude” from Algae
Editor’s note: This post is a guest contribution by Adam Shake.
Do you remember going to the local pond or lake as a kid and swimming around without a care in the world? Do you remember the feel of the algae between you’re toes? Well if New Zealand company Aquaflow Bionomic has anything to say about it, we may be using that same algae to fuel our vehicles.
The company, founded in 2005, says that it has produced the first samples of green crude oil at a commercially competitive price. This could be great news for a lot of Bio-Fuel “Flip-Floppers.” The question of utilizing land based crops producing Ethanol, or animal / vegetable oil based Bio-diesel, may be coming to a close with this new contender.
- » See also: Scientists Researching How Plants Can Make Petroleum
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Green Crude is made from wild algae grown on human sewage, and as such, would not use valuable acres which could then be used to, say, grow more food instead of fuel.
The company states that Green Crude produces 90 per cent less emissions than regular diesel, and in addition, it produces a great byproduct, clean Water for irrigation or industrial re-use.
Aquaflow chairman, Barrie Leay, said “We can separate fuels such as diesel and aviation fuels, as well as a range of high value chemicals.” He then went on that “Aquaflow’s technology appears to provide solutions to the two most significant issues globally - energy security and water security.”
We live in a world with a steadily growing population, and that population demands more and more fuel. Our planet only has so many acres of farm-able land, and as a result, the growing need for Corn based Ethanol is leading to deforestation and wold-wide increases in corn and grain prices, not to mention damage to the Environment through unsustainable Farming and overuse of chemicals and fertilizers.
Perhaps the time has come, to look outside the barrel and bushel, and towards the green stuff that squishes between our toes.
More on Algae Biofuels from Gas 2.0:
- First Algae Biodiesel Plant Goes Online: April 1, 2008
- Taking Algae Biofuel to the Next Level: Solazyme Gets $45 Million
- First Heavy-Duty Diesel Powered By Algae Biodiesel
Souces: Aquaflow Group and New Zealand Herald
Image Credit: Jasoneppink via Flickr under Creative Commons License
There are at least half a dozen companies out there racing to be the first to commercially produce algae-based biofuel. The benefits are obvious: While corn can produce 150 - 200 gallons of biofuel per acre an algae-based bioreactor farm can make 20 THOUSAND gallons per acre annually. It’s a great carbon sequestering scheme, too, as only part of the algae produced is converted to fuel, the rest is turned into high-nitrogen fertilizer.
The only problem with the fuel produced is it’s no good in cold climates: freezes in the fuel lines. Whoever licks that problem and gets the capitol to build production reactors will make a fortune.
I don’t believe it for a minute:
“it has produced the first samples of green crude oil at a commercially competitive price”
Funny. I do believe it. OTOH, I have been following this for a year or so.
Then we can let the Islamic world slip peacefully back into the 7th century. Makes everybody happy, right?
If this pans out at working scale, it looks like a new direction in sewage treatment is coming. This could be a significant cash cow for municipalities.
More money for the politicians to steal.
Geesh.
Go check out the 6 to 10 inch layer of oily muck on the sea floor off the mouth of the Mississippi in the Gulf. The result of a huge algae bloom.
Where do you think oil and coal comes from, anyway? (Well, if you believe the Russian, oil comes from calcium carbonate and iron, but I digress…)
Until they report and post their actual production and processing cost, pardon me if I yawn again. I suspect the catch line here is a “commercially competitive price.” Most biofuel producers are so far from market realities that “competitive” could mean anything. Any competitive biofuel has to compete with the commodity market price for a similar petroleum based fuel and or crude. To date I haven’t found any algae oil company that can produce biodiesel that’s even competitive with vegetable oil at about $8.00/gal. That isn’t anywhere close to “competitive” with anything. We have to remember that as late as 2003 that crude oil was being sold under $30/barrel - that means actual production cost were much lower. Remember that in 1998 crude prices were under $13 a barrel. While prices may have risen some what, I think you can see that crude production costs are much, much, lower than $30 a barrel - or lower than about $0.75/ gallon (2003 crude prices). This means that BIG OIL can, have and will shut out bio fuel developers at will, simply by lowering the prices - far below the costs of algae oip production and processing.
So when Aquaflow posts their crude algae oil production (and more importantly their certified processing costs) below $0.75/gallon - or even a biodiesel below $3.00/gal - they’ll make me a believer in their not so unusual processes (compared to all the other algae oil developers). Without actual costs being reported… yawn, it’s just another day in the biofuel investor seeking PR world.
pEEk OIL, PEAK PRICING, AND PIQUE BIO-GAS (TOO)?
There is plenty of oil, gas & coal on the planet; and it’s cheap to produce. But producers only let us pEEk at a portion of the global glut of oil, gas & coal.
Have you noticed that oil & gas deposits act as a magnet for wars, terrorism & chaos (e.g., Nigeria, Iraq, Iran, Darfur, Columbia, Falklands, etc., etc.)? The quantity of UN-PROVEN reserves in those areas is HUGE. “Peak Oil,” my gas!
The big Hydrocarbon Boys & Girls have artificially suppressed & prevented exploration, drilling, mining, refining, transport & marketing (now with disguises of environmentalism & Global Farting). This maintains Peak Pricing. Sell less. Charge more. (A lot more.)
‘Peak Pricing’ is a function of big Hydrocarbon Boys & Girls running scared. Algae-based & other biofuels are growing in market potential — and may be cheap.
However, the real ‘Killer App’ for ‘Peak Pricing’ may be the Tesla-type ‘New Energy’ technologies (e.g., so-called ‘Zero Point Energy,’ which may be a misnomer that misleads the scientists & funders RE-developing these quasi-simple energy technologies).
As biofuels & other energy tech cheaply come to market, big Hydrocarbon Boys & Girls exploit current energy oligopolies to continue Peak Pricing. Quasi-scientific, neo-Malthusian, global-farting alarmists semi-wittingly assist the big, legally-price-gouging hydrocarbon producers in their Peak Pricing exploits.
Aqua-Flow & other biofuels companies do us a favor by mounting market-based attacks on Peak Pricing. We may want to fund & pique these bio-fuels in the gas.
“The only problem with the fuel produced is it’s no good in cold climates: freezes in the fuel lines. ”
If you are talking about biodiesel use in northern climates you are correct: there are problems with gelling. However, you would have to consider that biodiesel made from different feedstocks has different properties. For example canola oil is thinner and so produces a thinner biodiesel than soy oil due to its shorter carbon chains which freeze/crystalize/gel at higher temperatures.
Algae strains can be cultivated with higher levels of the thinner oils for use in northern climates.
Reduced American consumption of oil at any price due to the depression we find ourselves in will only make oil cheaper for the Chinese, and easier for them to cut our throats in the marketplace. We are at tho top of a very steep hill, and oil from algae, a good idea when oil was $147.00 bbl seems very far from the solution to our economic woes.