Peak Oil is You
Donate Bitcoins ;-) or Paypal :-)
Page added on February 9, 2014
Unlimited oil from sunlight and slime changes the energy game
It is ironic that, just as we are finally saying goodnight and farewell to Peak Oil theory, scientists are poised to bring unlimited quantities of the finest sweet crude oil to market, courtesy of algae and sunlight. Moreover, the algae route to creating oil is said to generate 95% fewer greenhouse gasses than the conventional route of drilling for oil, so, even if climate change activists would rather that we stopped using oil altogether, “green oil” goes a long way towards meeting most of their objections.
Named hydrothermal liquefaction, the process mimics the natural processes, such as the application of intense heat and pressure, that turned vast seas of algae into reservoirs of crude oil over millions of years. The headline for PNNL’s statement on the breakthrough reads, Million year natural process takes minutes in a lab, which says it all, really. The process has a slurry of wet algae pumped into the front end of a chemical reactor:
Once the system is up and running (at the required temperature and pressure), out comes crude oil in less than an hour, along with water and a by-product stream of material containing phosphorus that can be recycled to grow more algae. With additional conventional refining the crude algae oil is converted into aviation fuel, gasoline or diesel fuel. And the waste water is processed further, yielding burnable gas and substances like potassium and nitrogen which, along with the cleansed water, can also be recycled to grow more algae.”
What is so astonishing about the PNNL process is not only the speed with which the transformation of algae into oil takes place, but the number of efficiency gains that PNNL’s approach generates. Project lead Douglas Elliott points out that cost has been the major roadblock keeping algae fuel production out of the mainstream. A huge part of the cost in previous production processes has been the need to dry the algae before processing, which was very energy intensive. The high water content of PNNL’s process – between 80% and 90% – completely does away with this area of cost. Furthermore, the PNNL process is a continuous process, with algae being constantly fed in at the front end and oil (and waste water) coming out the other end. Its demonstration scale chemical reactor only processes about 1.5 liters of algae slurry an hour, but there are no technical barriers to scaling it up to produce commercial quantities.
A third major benefit of the PNNL process is that it does not require complex processing of the algae soup using solvents like hexane to extract the oils from the algae slime. A combination of extremely hot water (the system runs at 350 degrees centigrade) and high pressures (3000 PSI) break the algae apart, converting the bulk of the biomass into liquid and gas fuels, PNNL says. As Elliott notes:
It’s a bit like using a pressure cooker, only the pressures and temperatures we use are much higher. In a sense, we are duplicating the process in the Earth that converted algae into oil over the course of millions of years. We’re just doing it much, much faster.”
PNNL is working with long time commercial partner Genifuel Corp, which has worked with Elliott’s team since 2008, and which is carrying out a full commercial assessment of the technology. The whole project shows the importance of government funding in enabling radically new solutions to the world’s energy problems to make the transition from the laboratory to the real world. PNNL’s work on algae fuels is part of the DoE’s National Alliance for Advanced Biofuels & Bioproducts, which in turn is funded by funds from the DoE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
35 Comments on "Unlimited oil from sunlight and slime changes the energy game"
rollin on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 2:38 pm
Errors from the get-go, algae bio-fuel is not crude oil so how can it effect Peak Oil theory.
What is the source of energy to reach 350 deg C at 3000 psi. If it’s not sunlight, then what is the EROEI (2:1, 1.5:1???). Algae are only about 2 or 3 percent efficient at collecting energy.
Why use such a low energy system that is water and mineral intensive when we have collectors that are 10 to 30 times more efficient already.
So after you make diesel at 2% effiency then use it in a vehicle that is maybe 15% efficient. most of that sunlight is wasted.
We can do far better than this and save a lot of resources doing it.
ghung on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 3:07 pm
How many acre-feet of algae does it take to make a barrel of this stuff?
rockman on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 3:22 pm
It also seems to be suffering from the same misconception some folks have about the EROEI od drilling for oil/NG. Even if the process can be developed to produce a nice positive EROEI of, say 3, will it be economical? A well with an EROEI of 5 or 6 won’t get drilled if the rate of return is insufficient. That seems to be a common missing component of many alt ideas: the focus is almost entirely on the thermodynamics and not the economics.
And usually for good reason: noncommercial scale pilot project had yet to be built. Many dramatic systems can be built on the work bench where the cost greatly exceeds the result. Such efforts are certainly necessary and should be applauded. But hyping them as “solution” before the first profitable Btu is generated just produces premature if not false hope.
george on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 3:46 pm
thanks for the morning laugh author
rollin on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:08 pm
This makes the thermal differential power systems in the ocean look possible. Certainly less harmful.
One of the ones I like is the cargo ships with spinning sails. The wind produces electricity which drives the ships electric propulsion. Of course the diesel-electric system is on board for backup. At least this system should greatly reduce fuel usage. At lest worth some testing.
rollin on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:12 pm
Ghung, I did some quick calculations on this once and the area of ponds needed would be huge. Should have kept the calculations but the scale seemed so outrageous that I tossed it.
If they intend on growing the algae in glass vessels, the cost of infrastructure would kill the thing before it starts.
They also have a dangerous competitor, bacteria that produce fuel directly. Crazy idea, especially when it gets in the environment, but so far we haven’t stopped much of any toxic material from starting to be used. Always after the fact.
SilentRunning on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:13 pm
I ran the first paragraph of the above story through my BS to English translator, and here’s what came out:
*******
Extremely Limited Oil from Sunlight and Slime does Nothing to Alter the Energy Predicament
It is totally predictable that, just as we are entering the terminal phase of Peak Oil, people are in deep denial of the facts, and pretending that somebody, somewhere will somehow bring unlimited quantities of the finest sweet crude oil to market, courtesy of algae and sunlight. Moreover, the fantasy algae route would be said to generate 95% fewer greenhouse gasses than the conventional route of drilling for oil, so, as well as breed colorful species of unicorns and leprechauns. Such is the nature of human delusion when facing painful truths.
Thoreau up on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:26 pm
Quote:
“Its demonstration scale chemical reactor only processes about 1.5 liters of algae slurry an hour, but there are no technical barriers to scaling it up to produce commercial quantities.”
HAHAHAHAHHA!
Ahhhh, hahahahahahhahahah!
Northwest Resident on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:28 pm
All across the world, private (retail) investors are sitting at their computers, reading this magnificent vision of the future, thinking that all they need to do to get rich is to keep the faith, believe in the technology that will save us all, invest their hard-earned $$$ into oil and watch the investment grow. Also, all across the world, oil company executives are sweating in their sleep with nightmares of impending doom, and their only hope is to drill baby drill but they don’t have enough investment capital to get that expensive stuff out of the ground, so they wake up and go to their PR department and order the writers to come up with articles like this one, to rope-a-dope those private investors in.
ghung on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:34 pm
www [dot] genifuel [dot] com/text/20100801%20Equipment%20and%20Feedstock%20Photos.pdf
Jerry McManus on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 4:37 pm
“…not exactly a winning proposition”
Well, that pretty much sums it up in a nutshell.
rockman on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 5:28 pm
T – “…but there are no technical barriers to scaling it up to produce commercial quantities.” Just as there are no technical barriers to producing those trillions of “technically recoverable” bbls of oil resources out there. There’s also no technical barriers to recovering millions of ounces of gold from sea water. Financial barriers…that’s another matter.
andya on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 5:58 pm
Well I can already turn barley into a flammable liquid, the process is safe, scales up, proven technology and so simple you can do it at home. I believe 40% of the corn crop is being used in a similar process, and provides a tiny fraction of fuel needs. Even were it possible there is no way to replace half a billion years of growth with factories.
andya on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 5:58 pm
“Even were it PROFITABLE” is what I was supposed to type.
J-Gav on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:11 pm
Thoreau – Nothing personal against slime but I had a good belly laugh there myself.
BillC on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:45 pm
Hey!
I got an idea. Lets raise whales and use whale oil. LOL
Knuckleheads hear about something for the first time and write about like no one else knows about algae. Meanwhile those of us regulars here have known it is a looser.
Feemer on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:47 pm
Well you could never produce 90 million barrels of this a day, but a bigger concern would be getting enough phosphorous and nitrogen as wells as water (assuming it uses freshwater)
Feemer on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:51 pm
So you add algae, and it takes an hour, but this doesn’t account for the time and energy spent growing the algae. Iv’e seen algae farms, the water must be in constant motion, and spun but a ‘turbine’ of sorts, that takes energy.
eugene on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:56 pm
My suggestion is we gather all the BS solutions and see if they’re good for something. If nothing else, they fuel a lot of fantasies. But then maybe the author had a hit or two before writing the article. I can remember some wonderful solutions in days of old.
Feemer on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 6:56 pm
There are only two things that could save the world from peak oil: Hemp and fusion. And neither of them could be implemented fast enough even if they were available right now and all the infrastructure was in place.
nemteck on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 7:01 pm
“….350 degrees centigrade ..” The temperature scale is always named after a man: Celsius, Fahrenheit, Kelvin, Reaumur.
Centi is Latin for 1/100 like centimeter centiliter, etc. Thus 350 centigrade is 350/100 = 3.5 degrees,very cool indeed and maybe this is another “cold fusion” process.
It is often so that people want to sound scientific by using the metric system but have no clue.
Nothwest Resident on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 7:37 pm
Feemer — I have often wondered if the national trend toward legalization of marijuana/hemp, with solid political figures from both sides suddenly endorsing the trend, has anything to do with the fact that TPTB are looking into the low-energy availability future and seeing the true potential of hemp. I doubt that it has anything to do with the millions of lives ruined due to legal problems related to marijuana usage, or a rational attempt to deprive drug gangs of illegal funds from selling the pot, or any kind of legitimate attempt to help cancer patients who find true relief from using the drug — those idealistic reasons never mattered, until now.
Newfie on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 7:49 pm
Wow that’s good news. I went out and bought the Mother of all Hummers.
DC on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 8:04 pm
This is the 2nd article related to this company. Since they have no viable ‘product’, or ever will for that matter, this qualifies as an ADVERT, ie spam. They are look’n fer toilet paper dollars to flush down the toilet.
‘High-tech’ snake oil. Content-free, articles pimping for investor dollars should be vetted better before being allowed….
CAM on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 9:13 pm
“Unlimited Oil”? Here we go again!!! Can’t wait to see them scale this up to a thousand barrels a second! The sun may provide energy but not the nutrients (biomass) required by the algae to grow and reproduce.
Graeme on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 9:13 pm
Attacks on this tech are mostly fossil fuel misinformation and propaganda. They don’t want any competition.
Stilgar Wilcox on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 9:54 pm
I’ll believe algae oil achieved success when driving into a fuel station that says ‘Algae Fuel’ and the price is $3.00 per gallon, and after filling up the vehicle runs great with no problems later from having used it. Then as the years pass the price doesn’t edge up to 4.50 a gallon.
Short of that I’ll figure these type of articles are for startups like this to amass as much investor money as they can generate for their golden parachute, purchase property away from civilization, load up on solar and canned food, then exit stage left just as post peak oil shtf.
Beery on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 10:21 pm
Aaaah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Oh, this article is priceless.
J-Gav on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 11:10 pm
Graeme – Do you have any idea how difficult it is to control the reproductive rate of algae? Or any idea of how scaling tha
J-Gav on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 11:11 pm
… scaling that up would create a new and fragile dependency?
Harquebus on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 11:13 pm
Peak oil is not a theory. It is an observation.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Sun, 9th Feb 2014 11:42 pm
Authoritative. Comprehensive. Concise. QFINANCE.com is a free online resource for finance professionals, academics and students created by Bloomsbury Information Ltd in partnership with the Qatar Financial Centre Authority. It is a unique collaboration of more than 300 of the world’s leading practitioners and visionaries in finance and financial management, covering key aspects of finance including risk and cash-flow management, operations, macro issues, regulation, auditing and raising capital. Resources include best practice articles, checklists, viewpoints, a daily commentary and a 9,000+ term dictionary.
Well, these guys are fishing. They cast some bait out to drum up some capex.
Yea, look at the area of the corn crop, fertilizer, irrigation, transport, infrastructure, and human component for how much liquid fuel supply……….yeap not much bang for buck. Then what about the dead zone in gulf, loss of food stock, inflation in the food system (burgers, bacon, corn syrup), and CO2 dump. Now that is corn but would not the equation be similar for an algae bio fuel infrastructure. There is unintended consequences if so much resources would be shifted to this technology to scale to a game changer. I am sure we would impact the food system further, water resources, Capex diversion, and human capital.
In any case it is too little too late.
Napoleon Bonaparte
Strategy is the art of making use of time and space. I am less concerned about the latter than the former. Space we can recover, lost time never.”
PrestonSturges on Mon, 10th Feb 2014 12:41 am
Looks like everyone else has already whacked this pinata.
DMyers on Mon, 10th Feb 2014 1:13 am
Look, I just invested the bulk of my “estate” in a herd of kerosene pissing cattle. This sounds even better than that!
bobinget on Mon, 10th Feb 2014 5:42 pm
No kid who ever spent a summer bucking hay would spend more then a minute of credence on this lab rat experiment.
We would be better served by science seeking substitutes for corn ethanol.