Growing green: Synthetic Genomics and ExxonMobil are collaborating on the development of photosynthetic algae to make biofuels.
Credit: Synthetic Genomics
Energy
Big Oil Turns to Algae
ExxonMobil invests $300 million in Synthetic Genomics to develop algae biofuel.
- Wednesday, July 22, 2009
- By David Ewing Duncan
Two of Craig Venter's recent passions have been combing the Earth for microbes and other minute critters that reveal the diversity of life, and creating and redesigning life itself through synthetic biology.
Never thinking small, Venter also has not been shy about blending research and commerce in his quest to finance and further his projects. In the 1990s he created Celera Genomics with over $1 billion in financing to compete with the public project to sequence the human genome.
There comes a point, he once told me, when projects need the king-size resources available in the private sector to scale up and implement. In this case, the goal is to produce a viable alternative fuel to petroleum and--just possibly, he insists--to reduce the fresh carbon spewed in the air when petroleum is burned.
Last week, ExxonMobil announced a commitment to invest $300 million over five to six years in Synthetic Genomics, which Venter founded and now leads as CEO, and to spend an additional $300 million on a complementary internal algae program.
The push is to take advantage of algae's ability to efficiently transform sunlight into lipids that can be relatively easily converted into diesel, gasoline, and possibly even advanced hydrocarbons used to manufacture plastics, chemicals, and other products.
By the barrel, algae fuel provides three to four units of energy for every unit used to make it--a ratio that approaches petroleum's 5-to-1 level of efficiency. The ratio for making ethanol from corn is a mere 1.2 to 1, according to some studies. Even making ethanol from cellulosic plants like switchgrass, researchers can achieve only a 2.5 to 1 ratio.
Venter's company has been developing strains of bioengineered algae that ramp up the output of lipids and can in some cases produce hydrocarbons directly. However, Venter and Emil Jacobs, senior vice president for R&D at ExxonMobil Research and Engineering, both emphasize that their companies will collaborate to investigate any viable option to push algae into the big time of energy sources.
Since research in algae fuels began in the 1970s at the Department of Energy--as part of President Jimmy Carter's efforts to develop alternative fuels after the oil shocks of that era--several methods have emerged.
First is an open-pond system that grows algae out in the sun. Another is a closed, sunless system that feeds carbon from feed stock such as sugarcane to algae plants in fermentation tanks. A third type is a closed-system bioreactor that uses sunlight.
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rvandell
22 Comments
- 1399 Days Ago
- 07/22/2009
What! and I just spent a c-note cleaning my "winterized" pool! (set it and forget it sure-fire algae creation). I could have been the next T-Boone Pickens!..
mkogrady
425 Comments
mkogrady
425 Comments
- 1399 Days Ago
- 07/22/2009
Exxon Reinventing the Wheel - try Killer Algae Instead
Killer Algae or Caulerpa taxifolia is a menace to the warmer waters of our planet and is an ecological nightmare. It has the following characteristics and grows like crazy.
Fatty acid composition was monitored in Caulerpa taxifolia collected from January to December 1998 in the northern Adriatic Sea. Saturated (45.2–73.7%), monounsaturated (10.3–25.9%) and polyunsaturated (16–34.3%) fatty acid proportions varied considerably during the period investigated. The Caulerpa growth cycle proceeded through a) minor changes during the latent and growth recruitment phase in spring, b) a gradual increase in unsaturated fatty acids during maximum growth in the summer/early autumn period and c) an abrupt increase, particularly of polyunsaturated fatty acids, during biomass maintenance and survival as lowering temperatures approached the lethal level. These variations were similar to those found in native algal species of temperate regions. Stimulation of growth and spreading can be partly explained by successful adaptation of C. taxifolia to the seasonality of environmental parameters (primarily temperature).
Now correct me if I am wrong, BUT aren't "Saturated (45.2–73.7%), monounsaturated (10.3–25.9%) and polyunsaturated (16–34.3%) fatty acids" a type of lipid and something which can be refined into biofuel?
If millions of acres of this stuff is growing rampant from Greece, Italy and Spain to California and down to Florida AND can survive cooler waters does the planet have a viable source for biofuels?
DennisBuller
119 Comments
- 1399 Days Ago
- 07/22/2009
This article leaves out a lot of important detail.
For example, the Algae they are developing excretes oil, instead of having to be harvested.
For a better overview see here:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2009/07/17/could-exxon-go-green-oil-giant-invests-in-algae-biofuel-research/
greymase
5 Comments
- 1390 Days Ago
- 07/31/2009
While not mentioned in the article, I think that harvesting presents other environmental opportunities, such as feed stock for animal farming, or, my own preference, pyrolizing for carbon sequestration with the resultant charcoal provided to farmers as an organic soil amendment. Of course, once the excreting algae has tun its life cycle, it could be used for similar purposes, so this is a density wave issue...but it may be harder to separate the dead fro the productive algae than in harvesting.
buda3d2007
3 Comments
- 1398 Days Ago
- 07/23/2009
There is one company that has created the means to get oil out of algae in a closed loop system for potential automation, and that is Origin Oil.
They have a website too demonstrating the process on video and have diagrams of the algae farm needed to do so, as well as monitored lighting for constant photosynthesis allowing all algae to receive light instead of only the algae on top.
http://www.originoil.com/
takchess
3 Comments
- 1398 Days Ago
- 07/23/2009
David Ewing Duncan please provide source for the Algae EROEI figures in your article. Was if from one of the parties in the joint venture?
Thanks
davidewingduncan
13 Comments
- 1397 Days Ago
- 07/24/2009
The EROI numbers in this column come from my story in Portfolio, http://www.portfolio.com/views/columns/natural-selection/2009/01/07/Algae-as-Alternative-Fuel-Source -- we had several sources for this information, and fact-checked it with experts at NREL -- DOE's National Renewable Energy Laboratory. The NREL website has information about the EROI of different strains of algae, also check http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html -- I also ran this by experts at NREL and at UCSD; for the petroleum figures, see this DOE document: http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/reserves/npr/Energy_Efficiency_Fact_Sheet.pdf
The EROI of petroleum has been falling over the years, I used 1:5 as a conservative number based on DOE data and consultation with various experts. Hope this helps.
StupidPeasant
98 Comments
- 1395 Days Ago
- 07/26/2009
It is a ruse. 300 mill. in five years to big EX is just a marketing expense. Do not look at the man behind the curtain
filipoff
2 Comments
- 1379 Days Ago
- 08/11/2009
methylated sprit from CO2
http://wiadomosci.pl.msn.com/zkraju/article.aspx?cp-documentid=149120275
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takchess
3 Comments
EROEI
"By the barrel, algae fuel provides three to four units of energy for every unit used to make it--a ratio that approaches petroleum's 5-to-1 level of efficiency"
Where does this figure come from? Does that include the power to grow the algae and it's pumping and drying during the process?
Reply
mkogrady
425 Comments
Re: EROEI
Algae's grow in water (fresh or Salt), with simple sunlight and can be augmented with CO2 for more rapid growth. The stuff isn't dried to pull out the oils (lipids) for Biofuel.
You could probably flood some of the Mojave Desert or Death Valley areas with brackish water, dump in some starter cultures for these genetically engineered algae's, pipe in some CO2 using the nations network of oil pipelines for transporting sequestered CO2 and let the stuff grow wild.
All you would have to do is collect the pond scum that developes periodically and refine it somehow.
What some really smart guy needs to do is develop a DIY kit for homeowners to brew up their own and make the American Dream a reality by allowing each of us to be self sufficient.
The comment about spending $100 on cleaning up the family pool is interesting in that you could probably install your pond in your back yard and grow your own fuel per se is not that far fetched. It depends on how aggressive these algaes can grow. Like Genetic Corn seed, you buy your starter cultures from some "algae" supplier and farm your own goo.
Anybody have a picture of what an Algae Refinery Looks Like? Scale one down and have Popular Mechanics draw up some plans for a weekend warrior project.
Reply
kstauff
130 Comments
Re: EROEI
Algae won't grow without CO2. It's not a luxury to make it grow faster, it's an absolute necessity.
As for growing my own and somehow refining that? Umm, no. I don't need a smelly pond in my backyard that I have to harvest weekly for fuel with some contraption that hasn't yet been invented.
Reply
erbium
343 Comments
Harvest with some contraption that hasn't been invented?
It's called a condenser in some cases of algae production. Hillbillies (Hill Williams to you :) have been doing this for years.
Major chemical company dow a few weeks ago in article on this website:
http://www.technologyreview.com/business/23009/
announced they are already building algae fuel plant based on strain of algae that GIVES OFF alcohol, which then diffuses up into head space above tank in a continuous process. They're building 3,100 reactors of 4,000 liters each on 24 acres near freeport TX
So basically you'd just need a condenser, kind of like the sheet of plastic you put over a questionable water hole in the desert will condense clean water on the plastic.
You might want better cooling like the coiled tubing above a still that americans have been building for years in rural areas.
Reply