In fact, algae has been known to produce as much as 5, biofuel gallons from a single acre in one year. The US Government first explored algae as a petroleum alternative during the energy crisis in the s. It abandoned the project in the s because they were unable to make it competitive with the pricing of petroleum. However, with the rising costs of oil and an imperative to find clean-energy solutions, both oil companies such as Exxon and venture capitalists are pouring money into solving the algae-as-fuel equation.
Algae oil extraction is a costly process and difficult to scale. The Energy Biosciences Institute EBI in Berkeley projected that development of cost-competitive algae biofuel production will require long-term research , development, and demonstration.
Why not start now? Scaling algae for biofuel production is not without its challenges. For one, algae growth is rapid and has been historically hard to manage and optimize. This can be addressed with new technology, like machine learning and AI, that helps to manage the growth process in order to ensure that growth happens through a managed and predictable cadence. Another limiting factor is the cost of implementation and the difficult road to profitability for many of these technologies.
However, the time to be cheap is over. We need to consider alternative options that are planet-effective, not just cost-effective. We need more investible capital in long0term solutions that help to solve big problems. The current five-year investment cycle for most VC-backed companies is too short for addressing major moonshot problems like climate change. To make these solutions work, we need investment options that allow for more gradual profit return and longer-term planning, thinking, and execution.
Algae is an increasingly viable alternative for many costly climate-change solutions. In fact, algae are protists, a completely different kingdom.
These differences are multifarious and many of them, visible to the naked eye. For those struggling to recall those primary school biology lessons, photosynthesis is a chemical reaction that occurs inside plants and organisms after they take in sunlight, water and carbon dioxide CO2. The purpose of this is to create glucose from which they can acquire energy to live, however a useful byproduct — for the animal kingdom, at least — is oxygen O2.
Algae have been in existence for hundreds of millennia. In fact, red algae fossils recently discovered in Chitrakoot, India are believed to date back an estimated 1. Yet, in spite of their impressive lineage — which predates both plants and animals — many hold the plant kingdom responsible for the oxygenated air we breathe.
But this is, in fact, incorrect. And it has been accumulating in the atmosphere because of them for millions of years. Yet, as remarkable as this fact is, it barely scratches the surface of how heroic these organisms could turn out to be. One of the many awe-inspiring things about algae, Professor Greene explains, is that they can grow between ten and times faster than land plants. Take, global warming. Algae sequesters CO2, as we have learned, but owing to the fact they grow faster than land plants, can cover wider areas and can be utilised in bioreactors, they can actually absorb CO2 more effectively than land plants.
AI company Hypergiant Industries, for instance, say their algae bioreactor was times more efficient at taking in CO2 than trees. Too many to fathom, although one idea is to start positioning algae plants next to factories powered by fossil fuels, so the CO2 can be taken out of the atmosphere as it is emitted.
Algae would need fertiliser to grow — a lot of it — and plenty of electricity too and where will that come from, fossil fuels? You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer. In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.
Researchers have long suggested that climate change could mean more damage from algal blooms — runaway growths of algae that can strangle marine ecosystems and devastate coastal economies.
Now, a study has unpicked how warming ocean temperatures have already driven an intensification of blooms around North America — the first time this link has been established at an ocean scale 1. Harmful algal blooms can occur when changes in water conditions lead to a huge growth in the number of a particular species of algae. The blooms can produce toxins, become so large that they kill marine life, and even turn water a different colour.
Research has established that one factor that helps blooms to spread is a sudden increase in nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus — often from agricultural fertilizers — and it has also linked warming temperatures to individual events. But the broader influence of climate change on these outbreaks is less well quantified.
Christopher Gobler, who studies coastal ecosystems at Stony Brook University in Southampton, New York, and his colleagues looked at the relationship between blooms in the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans and temperature changes in the region to investigate whether the events there were linked to were linked to ocean warming.
Previous research has studied the influence of climate change on algal blooms in individual coastal systems, says Gobler, but this is the first to assess ocean-basin-wide trends. The researchers looked at two species of algae: Alexandrium fundyense and Dinophysis acuminata.
These species produce toxins that can cause illnesses — sometimes fatal — in humans who eat shellfish contaminated with them. They used detailed data on sea-surface temperatures to model trends in the growth rates of the algae species and the periods when blooms occurred from the early s into the twenty-first century.
Sunday's study showed that algae, taken from water 15 degrees C 59 Fahrenheit warm off Norway, tended to evolve to a smaller size in higher temperatures in experiments lasting more than a year but also grew faster, producing a larger mass overall.
Stephen Palumbi, a professor of biology at Stanford University, said there was evidence that some coral reefs or sea urchins could be more resilient than expected to ocean changes. I suspect personally that they will not solve the future climate problem because climate is changing far too fast.
Opinion polls, however, indicate that many voters believe that natural variations are to blame. The mismatch between scientific and public opinion complicates a plan by almost governments to work out a deal to limit global warming at a summit in late in Paris. Already a subscriber? Sign in. Thanks for reading Scientific American.
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