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wolram

Oil from algae

To me algae seems to be a profitable line of research for an alternative
to fossil fuels.

http://www.oilgae.com/

Any thoughts ?
Andre

Well, it might but,

The objective of biofuels is to recycle carbon instead of adding more carbon to the biosphere and have a sustainable source of energy.

The first question is the feasibility, what are the efforts and what is the nett result. After all the method converts direct solar energy into useable energy.

If we start with say 600 W/m2 solar energy at the equator, how much of that is actually going to propel that train. How much energy is lost in the process? I guess something like 99,9%.

How many trains can we propel if we transfer the equator into a biofuel plant? The result may be dissapointing but there will be no more rain forests of which I'm a passionate fan.

So you'd say you don't need to cut the rain forests for biofuels, right?
But others do so, simply because of the market mechanism. If biofuel is popular, everybody want to take their pick. So unless you can prevent this and I don't see how, biofuel may not be the best of ideas in the transition to a sustainable economy.

And the climate? That's no incentive whatsoever. A bit more carbon in the air is highly benificial for most plants and increases the potential biomass on earth.
Andre

A very informative site about biofuels

http://www.oilcrisis.com/Patzek/

it is not mentioning algae though. The market mechanism would still work of course.
scpg02

Decoding mushroom’s secrets could combat carbon, find better biofuels & safer soils

Quote:
Researchers at the University of Warwick are co-ordinating a global effort to sequence the genome of one of the World’s most important mushrooms - Agaricus bisporus. The secrets of its genetic make up could assist the creation of biofuels, support the effort to manage global carbon, and help remove heavy metals from contaminated soils.

The Agaricus mushroom family are highly efficient ‘secondary decomposers’ of plant material such as leaves and litter –breaking down the material that is too tough for other fungi and bacteria to handle. How exactly it does this, particularly how it degrades tough plant material known as lignin, is not fully understood. By sequencing the full genome of the mushroom, researchers hope to uncover exactly which genes are key to this process. That information will be extremely useful to scientists and engineers looking to maximize the decomposition and transformation of plant material into bio fuels.

The mushroom also forms an important model for carbon cycling studies. Carbon is sequestered in soils as plant organic matter. Between 1–2 giga tons of carbon a year are sequestered in pools on land in the temperate and boreal regions of the earth, which represents 15–30% of annual global emissions of carbon from fossil fuels and industrial activities. Understanding the carbon cycling role of these fungi in the forests and other ecosystems is a vital component of optimizing carbon management.


http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/newsand...eases/decoding_mushrooms_secrets/

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