Algae Solution?

[Sean Malone]

I'm great on the innerwebs but fail at biology. How legit does this sound?

http://www.valcent.net/i/misc/Vertigro/index.html

[cameraman]

It is totally legit. There is another thread about it around here somewhere.

What you need is sun and lots of it. No haze, no clouds just sun hence his mention of New Mexico. It isn't inexpensive to build the infrastructure needed but oil at $140 a barrel sure as hell isn't inexpensive either. There are some surmountable problems, acquiring land, building thousands of acres of high tech green houses, building refineries, building pipelines, building facilities/processes to use the oil depleted algae, quite a bit of solar/wind generated electricity would also be needed to run all those facilities. It isn't simple but it could be done. That George Bush & his administration are only interested in drilling more holes in the ground hasn't helped either.

[Indy]

This is serious stuff. There are some big companies investing in it.

[cameraman]

The biggest potential drawback I can think of is viruses. Huge monocultures are very juicy smorgasbords for plant pathogens. Just ask a mid 18th century potato farmer. Anyone doing this is going to need to be unbelievably careful to keep things damn near sterile. That just adds to the cost & complexity of it all. It can be done but it needs to be done correctly.

There is no living organism on this planet that does not have a virus or a hundred that can infect it.

[Ankf00]

talking cellulosic ethanol?

[cameraman]

No the algae generate long chain fatty acids which can be used to make biodiesel or further refined into whatever you are looking for. Different algae make different fatty acids so you can tailor your farm towards the desired product. Pound for pound the algae make far more fatty acids than any other kind of plant and they are the fastest growing plant species. They also grow year round if kept warm & in the sun. After you have recovered the fatty acids you still have all the cell walls and that byproduct can get cooked down for cellulosic ethanol.

[oddlycalm]

Huge monocultures are very juicy smorgasbords for plant pathogens. A fact that the land grant university ag departments have attempted to ignore for the last 60yrs while they helped build our current agribusiness on a foundation of mush and wishful thinking . :gomer:

oc

[cameraman]

A fact that has kept the land grant university ag departments funded for the last 60yrs while they helped build our current agribusiness on a foundation of mush and wishful thinking . :gomer:

oc

Fixed it for you

[oddlycalm]

Fixed it for you

:D

oc

[Ankf00]

A fact that the land grant university ag departments have attempted to ignore for the last 60yrs while they helped build our current agribusiness on a foundation of mush and wishful thinking . :gomer:

oc


A fact that has kept the land grant university ag departments funded for the last 60yrs while they helped build our current agribusiness on a foundation of mush and wishful thinking :gomer:


so you're saying ag schools are like consultants...


:D

[eiregosod]

needs more starving phirana