The Grand Rapids Press reported yesterday that Michigan has granted funding to a project aimed at producing biodiesel fuel from algae. While large-scale algae biodiesel production has long thought to be possible, biodiesel fuel produced from oil extracted from algae has yet to be proven as feasible. Algae excretes oil in quantities far higher per acre than any other fuel crop and does not require the displacement of the country’s food crops. It is therefore quite tantilizing.

• Algae: 1800 gpa or more (est.- see soy figures and DOE quote below)
• Palm oil: 508 gpa
• Coconut: 230 gpa
• Rapeseed: 102 gpa
• Soy: 59.2-98.6 gpa in Indiana (Soy is used in 80% of USA biodiesel)
• Peanut: 90 gpa
• Sunflower: 82 gpa

From Michael Briggs, University of New Hampshire, Physics Department (see here):

One of the important concerns about wide-scale development of biodiesel is if it would displace croplands currently used for food crops.  In the US, roughly 450 million acres of land is used for growing crops, with the majority of that actually being used for producing animal feed for the meat industry.  Another 580 million acres is used for grassland pasture and range, according to the USDA’s Economic Research Service.  This accounts for nearly half of the 2.3 billion acres within the US (only 3% of which, or 66 million acres, is categorized as urban land).  For any biofuel to succeed at replacing a large quantity of petroleum, the yield of fuel per acre needs to be as high as possible.  At heart, biofuels are a form of solar energy, as plants use photosynthesis to convert solar energy into chemical energy stored in the form of oils, carbohydrates, proteins, etc..  The more efficient a particular plant is at converting that solar energy into chemical energy, the better it is from a biofuels perspective.  Among the most photosynthetically efficient plants are various types of algaes.

The Office of Fuels Development, a division of the Department of Energy, funded a program from 1978 through 1996 under the National Renewable Energy Laboratory known as the “Aquatic Species Program”. The focus of this program was to investigate high-oil algaes that could be grown specifically for the purpose of wide scale biodiesel production1. The research began as a project looking into using quick-growing algae to sequester carbon in CO2 emissions from coal power plants.  Noticing that some algae have very high oil content, the project shifted its focus to growing algae for another purpose - producing biodiesel.  Some species of algae are ideally suited to biodiesel production due to their high oil content (some well over 50% oil), and extremely fast growth rates. From the results of the Aquatic Species Program2, algae farms would let us supply enough biodiesel to completely replace petroleum as a transportation fuel in the US (as well as its other main use - home heating oil) - but we first have to solve a few of the problems they encountered along the way.

The new Michigan project is looking at the town of Holland for a production plant.

From the article:

In Holland, representatives of Bloomfield Hills-based Sequest LLC on June 13 toured the city’s wastewater and coal plant as a prospective site for its plan to divert carbon dioxide from the power plant, combine it with treated wastewater, and grow algae. The algae would then be converted to biofuels and other uses.

No one has done before. But if it works, Sequest CEO Bob Truxell believes it could help transform the world energy equation.

“We think it’s very economically feasible,” Truxell said.

Though four sites are under consideration, Truxell likes Holland because of the proximity of the coal and wastewater plants and a nearby Michigan State University research center to be housed in a former Pfizer Inc. development building.

“Later on, the algae strain will evolve and we will need the genetic help that is available at the research facility,” Truxell said.

“I personally am very excited about Holland. I hope we proceed there.”

One MSU official said the project, while daunting, is worth pursuing in a world worried about global warming and desperate for new fuel sources.

Greg Pahl is finishing up the second edition of his book, Biodiesel: Growing the Green Economy.

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