Blatant Reality

I missed this at the time but about a month, researchers discovered how to ‘steal’ an electrical current from algae. That means that they were actually able to collect electrons given off by the algal cells to produce an electrical current.

For the first time, scientists from California and Korea have successfully stolen an electric current from algae. The research could eventually create a new and environmentally friendly way to generate electricity.

“We have shown that we can steal an electrical current from algae,” said Fritz Prinz, a scientist from Stanford University and co-author of the ACS Nano Letters article.

…

In the scientists’ case, they stole electrons from a widespread and well studied algae called Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. To be able to extract energy from the algae, the scientists must first essentially jump-start the cells by applying what’s called an over voltage, a tiny current of electricity that zaps the cell into action.

The over voltage only works when the algae are exposed to sunlight. If the algae cells are zapped in the dark, they will not produce any current. When zapped and exposed to light, however, the electricity flows.

The amount of electricity was extremely small and was less than the initial ‘zap’ but this signifies a whole new area where algae could convert the sun’s energy into electricity. While I doubt this will lead to millions of dollars of research to find out how using algae for direct generation of electricity, it is beneficial to know and illustrates the versatility of algae in producing algae.

Read more on this Discovery News article here: http://news.discovery.com/tech/algae-electricity-stealing.html

There may be a conflict of interest with the head of NASA and the OMEGA algae research currently taking place at the agency. It seems that NASA Administrator Bolden also has hundreds of thousands if not close to a million of dollars worth of stock in an traditional oil company.

NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden doesn’t believe in OMEGA — and has sought to slow it down.

The reason: He was advised against it by Marathon Oil — the Texas-based company on whose board Bolden sat until he was named NASA administrator last year. The former astronaut and Marine Corps general also still holds as much as $1 million worth of Marathon stock.

He says that there hasn’t been any conflict and while I don’t know the particulars more than what this story offer, I tend to believe him. Algae research is still in its early stages and to think that he would knowing sabotage the research success seems to almost garner ‘conspiracy theory’ status. If the research is successful, algae is still likely decades away from a point where it could threaten oil and by then, oil companies could co-opt algae technologies to boost their profits (IE ExxonMobil with Synthetic Genomics).

Anyways, NASA’s algae research is fairly novel in their approach and deserves to be researched thoroughly. Here is what they are trying to do:

According to Jonathan Trent, the lead scientist behind the project, it starts with algae being placed in sewage-filled plastic bags, known in NASA-speak as “offshore membrane enclosures for growing algae” or OMEGA. The semipermeable plastic was originally developed to recycle astronauts’ urine during space missions.

Trent’s idea is to grow the algae in huge bags suspended in the ocean by feeding them wastewater. The algae — which pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere — would feast on nutrients in the sewage, turning it into clean water that would be released into the sea through the bags’ one-way membranes. Wave action would keep the algae mixed and healthy, producing fat-soluble molecules called lipids as the plants grow that would then be harvested for fuel.

If a tsunami or hurricane strikes, or if the bags leak, Trent says, seawater would kill the algae, and the lipids would break down naturally.

Read more of the article here: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/space/os-nasa-administrator-scandal-20100620,0,4126603.story

A recent article about Bio Architecture Lab, a little known company looking into using macro-algae for fuel, stated that they are about halfway to reaching their 90% conversion target, a target they hope to reach within a year.

Imagine the magnitude of the challenge facing Bio Architecture Lab. The secretive company confronts the same battle with high costs as it tunes its bioengineered microbe to convert seaweed to ethanol on a commercial scale. But money is nowhere near as plentiful.

In a rare discussion of its business, the Berkeley company says it is about halfway to its 90 percent fuel conversion target. Confidence is high, says Vineet Rajgarhia, senior vice president of research, who joined the firm in May when it appointed former Shell executive Daniel Trunfio as its CEO.

Reaching the target “is doable,” Rajgarhia said at the Cleantech Institute conference at the University of California, Berkeley. “It just needs a little more time.”

That “little more time” is expected to be about a year.

Other than just financial hurdles the company has had to overcome, logistical hurdles are also present.

Rajgarhia said a second key challenge Bio Architecture Lab faces is logistical: getting the macro-algae ashore at a cost low enough to produce affordable fuel. The seaweed is fast-growing, often proliferating at the rate of about 2 feet a day, so volumes can quickly add up. And current harvesting techniques are geared toward high-priced food production, so costs are not in line with the low-price-fuel paradigm.

For more on this story, click here: http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/a-formula-for-seaweed-fuel/

The University of Minnesota is holding a seminar to discuss rebuilding NREL’s Aquatic Species Program that was shut down in the mid-1990s. This program researched various species of algae and was one of the first major efforts supported by the U.S. government to look into the potential of algae as a fuel source.

Rebuilding the Aquatic Species Program at National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)

Phil Pienkos, Principal Research Supervisor, NREL

Presented by the Institute on the Environment’s Initiative for Renewable Energy and the Environment (IREE)

Low petroleum prices and projected high costs of algal biofuel production contributed to DOE’s decision to terminate the Aquatic Species Program in 1996. Ten years later, petroleum cost volatility, and a heightened awareness of the importance of energy security and greenhouse gas emissions led to a reevaluation of the potential for algae as a feedstock for biofuels and prompted NREL to restart its algal biofuels program. This presentation will outline NREL’s efforts to rebuild an integrated algal biofuels program and will provide some recent data from projects begun in the last three years.

This event will be broadcast live online via UMConnect: http://umconnect.umn.edu/IonE

To read more about this seminar, visit this site: https://events.umn.edu/Rebuilding-the-Aquatic-Species-Program-at-NREL—Philip-Pienkos-005584.htm

Recently, researchers have discovered that algae can grow much needed proteins used for health treatments better than traditional bacteria methods. Take a look:

The scientists reported in their paper that all of the algal-produced proteins in their study showed biological activity comparable to the same proteins produced by traditional commercial techniques. And because algae cells can be grown cheaply and quickly, doubling in number every 12 hours, they noted that algae could be superior to current biological systems for the production of many human therapeutic proteins.

“Currently, human therapeutic proteins are primarily produced from either bacteria or mammalian cell culture,” they said. “Complex mammalian proteins and monoclonal antibodies are primarily produced by the culture of transgeneic mammalian cells, while simpler proteins are generally produced by E. coli.”

“Due to high capital and media costs, and the inherent complexity of mammalian cell culture, proteins produced by mammalian cell culture are very expensive,” they added. “Bacterial production is generally more economical in terms of media components, but bacteria are often inefficient at producing properly folded complex proteins, requiring a denaturation and renaturation step that adds significant costs to bacterial protein production.”

The scientists said the percentage of human proteins produced in their algal cultures that were properly folded in three dimensions was comparable to the fraction produced by mammalian cell cultures and much better than that produced by bacterial systems. And because algae generate their energy from sunlight and have relatively simple nutrient needs, they said the costs for using them at large scale to commercially produce human proteins should be much lower than for mammalian cell culture, which require expensive fermentation facilities.

Ultimately, if this is found to be feasible, it could be another co-product for algae biofuel, thus helping cut down the cost for growth as well as providing another reason to continue research and funding into this field.

The Department of Energy just announced that it will be investing in
developing the next generation of Nuclear Plants. This announcement
comes after the actions of the Obama Administration to halt the
development of the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository without any
alternatives being offered.

Here is the press release:

Department of Energy Announces $40 Million to Develop
the Next Generation Nuclear Plant

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu today announced
selections for the award of approximately $40 million in total to two
teams led by Pittsburgh-based Westinghouse Electric Co. and San
Diego-based General Atomics for conceptual design and planning work
for the Next Generation Nuclear Plant (NGNP). The results of this
work will help the Administration determine whether to proceed with
detailed efforts toward construction and demonstration of the NGNP.
If successful, the NGNP Demonstration Project will demonstrate
high-temperature gas-cooled reactor technology that will be capable of
producing electricity as well as process heat for industrial
applications and will be configured for low technical and safety risk
with highly reliable operations. Final cost-shared awards are subject
to the negotiation of acceptable terms and conditions.

About 16 percent of the Nation’s greenhouse gas emissions come from
industrial process heat applications. The process heat or steam
generated by the high-temperature nuclear reactors could be used for
highly-efficient electricity co-generation, which has the potential to
help energy-intensive industries, such as petrochemical producers,
reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

“This investment reflects President Obama’s commitment to building the
next generation of nuclear reactors that will create thousands of jobs
and supply the clean energy to power our economy,” said Secretary Chu.
“It’s time for America to recapture the lead in the nuclear energy
industry and lay the foundation for a stronger, cleaner, and more
competitive economic future.”

The NGNP project is being conducted in two phases. Phase 1 comprises
research and development, conceptual design and development of
licensing requirements. The selections announced today will support
the development of conceptual designs, cost and schedule estimates for
demonstration project completion and a business plan for integrating
Phase 2 activities. The Department of Energy will use information from
its independent Federal advisory committee, the Nuclear Energy
Advisory Committee, information and data gathered in Phase 1, and
other factors in determining whether the project should continue to
Phase 2.

Phase 2 would entail detailed design, license review and construction
of a demonstration plant.

The Department will now negotiate the final terms and conditions for
the awards with the intention of completing conceptual designs by
August 31, 2010.

Aurora Biofuels was able to produce 1,000 gallons of algae based biofuel in a 1/8 acre open pond over the course of 18 months. The fuel was ATSM quality which means that it can be used in current engines. Aurora believes that they will be able produce 6,000 gallons per acre a year in full production mode.
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Click Here for the Article

OriginOil CEO Riggs Eckelberry proposed that algae biofuel corporations should take a more collaborative outlook in order to quickly implement algae as a leading fuel source worldwide.
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Many catfish farmers in Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama are thinking about converting to algae production. If they do this and sell the alge to PetroSun, the profits could be quite lucrative. Farmers could make about $1,000/acre per year.
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Algae is once againg makings its way into the headlines with a Japanese airline looking to be the fourth airline to use biofuels in a test flight tomorrow. However, the most interesting tidbit in this article is the claim that an algae farm the size of Belgium would produce enough fuel to power all commercial airlines worldwide.
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P.S. For those of you who aren’t near a map, Belgium is quite a small country.
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