Author: Carrie Cox

Earlier this year, Joule Unlimited Technologies, Inc. (Joule) received a key go-ahead from the EPA: Joule’s ethanol production process officially qualifies for advanced biofuel RINs. RINs act as the currency of compliance for the renewable fuels standard program; they confirm that incorporation of the approved fuel can be counted towards fulfilling the standard by refiners and importers. More concisely, it allows Joule to compete on even terms with other forms of ethanol.

The particular process that was approved is Joule’s Helioculture Sunflow-E process, which uses photosynthetic cyanobacteria (a form of algae) as a catalyst to produce/secrete ethanol. That ethanol is then collected and purified into a final product.

A key aspect of the approval process is determining a renewable fuel’s lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions as compared to a baseline gasoline lifecycle analysis. In this case, Joule’s product was determined to emit 14.7 kilograms CO2 equivalent per million btu as compared to baseline gasoline’s 98.2 kilograms CO2 equivalent per million btu: an 85% reduction.

This is certainly a key win for the company and for algae. As Brian Baynes, CEO of Joule succinctly put it, “the qualification from the EPA…provides our customers and partners with the full benefit of renewable fuels from a cost, production and environmental standpoint.”

For more information, see the EPA’s approval document.

The Department of Energy has announced six bioenergy projects to receive up to $10 million in funding for their innovative solutions to advance bioenergy development. Of the six projects awarded funding, three are in the Algae Biomass Organization family: two projects from Arizona State University for their innovative research pertaining to algae, and ABO member LanzaTech for its advanced technology that can transform greenhouse gases into valuable chemicals.

Details of the ABO-related projects selected:

• Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona: This project will engineer cyanobacteria for the production of ethyl laurate, which is easily converted to “drop-in” ready biofuels or bioproducts.
• Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona: This project will develop mixotrophic algae that can consume both CO₂ and cellulosic sugars, as well as significantly improve algal biomass growth. The potential for this project could reach 5 times the current algal production rates.
• LanzaTech Inc., Skokie, Illinois: This project will work on technology to enable manufacturing of the acetone, a high-value industrial chemical building block, via biomass-derived syngas.

The DOE’s selection of these projects is further evidence that awareness and recognition of algae and other biomass technologies is growing in Washington and beyond as ABO continues its outreach efforts.

The grants to ASU’s algae-based projects come are timely, as ABO is planning the 10th annual Algae Biomass Summit in Phoenix, AZ  October 23-26. Register now and join us at the world’s largest algae conference!

For more information on the DOE’s announcement, visit: http://energy.gov/eere/articles/doe-announces-10-million-innovative-bioenergy-research-and-development

A major Funding Opportunity Announcement from the U.S. Department of Energy for the Design and Construction of Manufacturing Facilities for Biofuels, Bioproducts, and Biopower makes up to $90 million available for pilot- and demonstration-scale facilities.

This is the first major funding from DOE for biomass/biorefinery demonstration and deployment projects in several years, and the first DOE funding opportunity for large-scale projects that includes non-fuel products. Projects utilizing algal feedstocks are explicitly eligible. 

This important funding opportunity for algae-based projects is in addition to the ongoing funding for algae R&D that ABO helped secure for Fiscal Year 2016.

The explicit inclusion of algae-based projects in this funding opportunity is evidence of DOE’s growing recognition of the importance of algae as a platform for next generation biomanufacturing, and another product of ABO’s ongoing outreach and education efforts in Washington.

ABO members are strongly encouraged to consider applying. Let’s ensure the common denominator of this opportunity’s awardees is: “There’s algae inside”.

Read more about this funding opportunity. 

ABO member TerraVia (Solazyme, Inc.) last week announced it (and corporate partner, Bunge) had reached a definitive commercial supply agreement with one of the world’s largest aquaculture feed suppliers to provide algae-derived omega-3 oils for incorporation into feed for farmed salmon.

While the announcement was met with little fanfare, its implications for both the algae and aquaculture industries are profound.

For the algae industry, the agreement demonstrates that feed suppliers are embracing algae as a feed ingredient, unlocking a multi-billion dollar market. For the aquaculture industry, it likely marks the beginning of a broader partnership with the algae industry to provide a new, sustainable source of both oils and proteins for farmed fish.

Don’t be surprised if there are more announcements to come this year in the algae animal nutrition world. Algae may well be the ‘it’ animal feed ingredient of 2016.

Algae has the potential to make a large impact as an ingredient in animal feed, according to Xingen Lei, professor of molecular nutrition at Cornell University. Lei, who has been studying algae’s nutritional benefits for years, is now focused on the use of the defatted and dried form of microalgae: the product left over after the production of biofuels.

Algae’s nutritional composition is ideally suited for animal feed: it has a greater percentage of protein than corn or soybeans (traditional feed inputs) as well high concentrations of lipids and carbohydrates. With increased demand for feed (as a result of increased demand for food as the world’s population continues to grow) algae would be an ideal supplement. Lei also notes that microalgae is equally if not more digestible and yields the same body lean as with conventional diets.

Macroalgae, meanwhile, has polysaccharides and sulfates that have the ability to improve immunity and help animals metabolize fats. While not a replacement for antibiotics, such algae could contribute towards a reduced need for them.

These benefits echo those enumerated in a study that we reported on in March. That study, published in Carbon Balance and Management, found that algaculture combined with a modest amount of carbon capture and sequestration could even help bring atmospheric carbon concentrations down to preindustrial levels by the end of the century.

In Lei’s case, he is looking at reducing the carbon footprint through using algae as biofuels and the resultant dried algae as an input for feed. From our perspective, both plans to make the world a better place through the use of algae sound great.

For more on Lei’s work, visit WATTAgNet.