It will take time as you said perhaps 3/4 years to determine the commercial viability of algae fuel. In the meantime we need R&D to focus on renewable energy technologies in general, especially algae and non food crop related energy sources.

The US is by a long shot the leader in oil from algae, so lets hope your soon to be Obama Administration taps onto the possibility and encourages research and development by funding programs. Last year US$3 million were invested in algae companies with Sapphire Energy taking the biggest chunk of that 1/3 to be precise from the Gates Foundation.

My particular concern (but not only) is developing countries, algae could be a way for them to either make revenue from producing algae oil and selling it to industrialised countries or to secure some energy themselves. Either way it would benefit them.

By the way I am a fan of Oilgae too, and will be happy to read your industry report.
Thanks
Tony

It is interesting to read about the new tech from OriginOil, but I think it is important to wait for a while to check out whether this will produce oil and biodiesel on a sustainable scale and also whether further improvements are possible in this tech.

The problem with the algae energy industry has pretty much been the same as with the rest of the biofuels and renewable energy industry – there has been a lot of hype, and it becomes difficult even for industry professionals to determine what is going to last forever versus what is just a one-day-wonder. Let’s hope technologies such as these from OriginOil prove to be the former.

That said, 2009 might very well be a big year for oil fromalgae, though I’d presume that it could take another 3-4 years before any company is able to make this a success on a commercial scale.

I represent Oilgae, and we are a premier resource for information and interaction on oil and energy from algae. More from our site http://www.oilgae.com (and we have also come out with a comprehensive industry report on algae energy (more on this here http://www.oilgae.com/ref/report/report.html )

And by the way, I’m a fan of your blog – lots of useful stuff – keep up the good work, and here’s wishing you a very prosperous 2009!

My concerns with Dr. Cuello’s approach are:

Rural communities don’t have sewage treatment plants. At best, they have pit latrines.
Plants that emit carbon dioxide at scales large enough to economically capture and channel through algae ponds are few and far between.

I like the idea of using brackish water in particular, don’t know about recycled water availability.

What would be even more interesting would be the ability for rural communities to acquire appropriate technology to extract oil from algae and produce fuel in small yet economically viable quantities.

Noble idea nonetheless.

I am excited to discover your website. If you respond, I will send you some photos of my fish & oyster aqufarm, all on land. I depend on the fish to culture phytoplankton in ponds and I pump the pond water through raceways to not only feed the shelfish but to convert ammonia & nitrites from both species into nitrates that return to enhance the cultures. Where your passion and mine will meet is when I have installed an anaerobic biodigester to be fed with high carbon, aerobically-derived compost that untilizes the fish guts and other wastes. Of course, after stripping the methane & CO2 — the former to run a generator, the latter to also enhance the cultures –from the digester, the remaining sludge will be the basis for a fish feed. I say “basis” because I will be adding algae, maggots and molasses (imported cheap from Fiji) to the sludge-feed. The algae is grown in the waste water from fish tanks as compared to fish ponds. A grant from FAO has been approved to further this work.

Kia manuia,

Tap Pryor
Manager,
Titikaveka Growers Association
Rarotonga, Cook Islands