Algae for biofuel in Hawaii

Tor-Eddie Fossbakk According to a press release from Shell, the announcement is a further step in the company’s ongoing effort to develop a new generation of biofuels using sustainable, non-food raw materials. Algae hold great promise because they grow very rapidly, are rich in vegetable oil and can be cultivated in ponds of seawater, minimizing the use of fertile land and fresh water. The two companies have formed a joint venture company, called Cellana, to develop this project. Construction of the demonstration facility on the Kona coast of Hawaii Island will begin immediately. The site, leased from the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority (NELHA), is near existing commercial algae enterprises, primarily serving the pharmaceutical and nutrition industries. The facility will grow only non-modified, marine microalgae species in open-air ponds using proprietary technology. Algae strains used will be indigenous to Hawaii or approved by the Hawaii Department of Agriculture. Protection of the local environment and marine ecosystem has been central to facility design. Once the algae are harvested, the vegetable oil will be extracted. The facility’s small production volumes will be used for testing. An academic research program will support the project, screening natural microalgae species to determine which ones produce the highest yields and the most vegetable oil. The program will include scientists from the Universities of Hawaii, Southern Mississippi and Dalhousie, in Nova Scotia, Canada. An advantage of algae is their rapid growth. They can double their mass several times a day and produce at least 15 times more oil per hectare than alternatives such as rape, palm soya or jatropha. Moreover, facilities can be built on coastal land unsuitable for conventional agriculture. Over the long term, algae cultivation facilities also have the potential to absorb or ‘capture’ waste CO2 directly from industrial facilities such as power plants. The Cellana demonstration will use bottled CO2 to explore this potential. HR Biopetroleum Inc., headquartered in Hawaii, is a developer of large-scale microalgae production technology. It was founded by a group of leading marine scientists and is dedicated to the development of commercially viable and socially responsible biofuel production technology. The company constructs and operates algae biofuels plants that use effluent gases from power plants to produce renewable fuels and to mitigate emissions of carbon.