Algae Oil Information

Micro-algae are the fastest growing photosynthesizing unicellular organisms and can complete an entire growing cycle every few days. Some algae species have high Oil content (up to 60% oil by weight) and can produce up to 15,000 gallons of oil per Acre per year under optimum conditions. One of the key reasons why algae are considered as feedstock for oil is their yields. Put simply, algae are the only biofeedstock that can theoretically replace all of our petro-fuel consumption of today and future. Owing to the fact that oil yields are much lower for other feedstocks when compared to those from algae, it will be very difficult for the first generationBiodiesel feedstock such as soy or palm to produce enough oil to replace even a small fraction of petro-oil needs without displacing large percentages of arable land towards crops for fuel production. Comparison of Biodiesel from Microalgal Oil and Diesel Fuel Properties Density Kg l-1 Viscosity Pa s Flash point C Solidifying point C Cold filter plugging point C Acid value mg KOH g-1 Heating value MJ kg HC ratio
-1

Biodiesel from Diesel Microalgal Oil 0.864 5.210 (40 C) 65-115* -12 -11 0.374 41 1.18
-4

Fuel

0.838 1.9 - 4.1 10-4 (40 C) 75 -50 - 10 -3.0 (- 6.7 max) 0.5 max 40 - 45 1.18

Algal Oil Yields

Microalgae, like higher plants, produce storage Lipids in the form of triacyglycerols (TAGs). Comparatively algae produce more oil than any other oilseeds which are currently in use. Many microalgalspecies can be induced to accumulate substantial quantities of lipids, often greater than 60% of their biomass. Comparison of average oil yields from algae with that from other oilseeds The table below presents indicative oil yields from various oilseeds and algae. Please note that there are significant variations in yields even within an individual oilseed depending on where it is grown, the specific variety/grade of the plant etc. Similarly, foralgae there are significant variations between oil yields from different strains of algae. The datapresented below are indicative in nature, primarily to highlight the order-of-magnitude differences present in the oil yields from algae when compared with other oilseeds. (See also: Vegetable Oils Yields & Characteristics from Journey to Forever)

Yields ( Gallons of oil per acre per year ) Corn Soybeans Safflower Sunflower Rapeseed Oil Palm Micro Algae 18 48 83 102 127 635 5000-15000

Source: http://oakhavenpc.org/cultivating_algae.htm Oil content of few microalgal species: Microalgal species Ankistrodesmus TR-87 Botryococcus braunii Chlorella sp. Oil content(% dw) 28-40 29-75 29

Chlorella 15-55 protothecoides(autotrophic/ heterothrophic) Cyclotella DI- 35 Dunaliella tertiolecta Hantzschia DI-160 Nannochloris Nannochloropsis Nitzschia TR-114 Phaeodactylum tricornutum Scenedesmus TR-84 Stichococcus 42 36-42 66 31(6-63) 46(31-68) 28-50 31 45 33(9-59)

Tetraselmis suecica Thalassiosira pseudonana Crpthecodinium cohnii Neochloris oleoabundans Schiochytrium

15-32 (21-31) 20 35-54 50-77

Biodiesel Production from Algae Oil

Algal oil is highly viscous, with viscosities ranging 1020 times those of no. 2 Diesel fuel. The high viscosity is due to the large molecular mass and chemical structure of oils which in turn leads to problems in pumping, combustion and atomization in the injector systems of a diesel engine. Therefore, a reduction in viscosity is important to make high-viscous oil a suitable alternative fuel for diesel engines. There are a number of ways to reduce vegetable oil's viscosity. These methods include; transestrification, pyrolysis (Pyrolysis Definition from AFR), micro Emulsion (Emulsions & Emulsification from Wikipedia), blending and thermal depolymerization. One of the most common methods used to reduce oil viscosity in the Biodieselindustry is called transesterification. It involves chemical conversion of the oil into its corresponding fatty ester.

Transesterification
The process of converting vegetable & plant oils intobiodiesel fuel is called transesterification, and is fortunately much less complex than it sounds. Transesterification refers to a reaction between an ester of one alcohol and a second alcohol to form an ester of the second alcohol and an alcohol from the original ester, as that of methyl acetate and ethyl alcohol to form ethyl acetate and methyl alcohol ( see also interesterification. Chemically, transesterification means taking a triglyceride molecule or a complex fatty acid, neutralizing the free fatty acids, removing the glycerin and creating an alcohol ester. This is accomplished by mixing methanol with sodium hydroxide to make sodium methoxide. This liquid is then mixed into vegetable oil. The entire mixture then settles. Glycerin is left on the bottom and methyl esters, or biodiesel, is left on top. The glycerin can be used to make soap (or any one of 1600 other products) and the methyl esters is washed and filtered.

Transesterification is not a new process. Scientists E. Duy and J. Patrick conducted it as early as 1853. One of the first uses of transesterified vegetable oil was powering heavy-duty vehicles in South Africa before World War II.

Transesterification of Algal Oil into Biodiesel

Transesterification of algal oil is normally done with Ethanol and sodium ethanolate serving as the catalyst. Sodium ethanolate can be produced by reacting ethanol with sodium. Thus, with sodium ethanolate as the catalyst, ethanol is reacted with the algal oil ( the triglyceride) to produce bio-diesel & glycerol. The end products of this reaction are hence biodiesel, sodium ethanolate and glycerol. This end-mixture is separated as follows: Ether and salt water are added to the mixture and mixed well. After sometime, the entire mixture would have separated into two layers, with the bottom layer containing a mixture of ether and biodiesel. This layer is separated. Biodiesel is in turn separated from ether by a vaporizer under a high vacuum. As the ether vaporizes first, the Biodiesel will remain. The biodiesel from algae is now ready for use!

Large-scale Biodiesel Production from Algae

Theoretically, Biodiesel produced from algaeappears to be the only feasible solution today for replacing petrodiesel completely. No other feedstock has the Oil Yield high enough for it to be in a position to produce such large volumes of oil. To elaborate, it has been calculated that in order for a crop such as soybean or palm to yield enough oil capable of replacing petro-diesel completely, a very large percentage of the current land available needs to be utilized only for biodiesel crop production, which is quite infeasible. For some small countries, in fact it implies that all land available in the country be dedicated to biodiesel crop production. However,

if the feedstock were to be algae, owing to its very high yield of oil per Acre of cultivation, it has been found that about 10 million acres of land would need to be used for biodiesel cultivation in the US in order to produce biodiesel to replace all the petrodiesel used currently in that country. This is just 1% of the total land used today for farming and grazing together in the US (about 1 billion acres). Clearly, algaeare a superior alternative as a feedstock for large-scale biodiesel production. In practice however, biodiesel has not yet been produced on a wide scale from algae, though large scale algae cultivation and biodiesel production appear likely in the near future (4-5 years). In order to produce biodiesel from algae on a large-scale, the following conditions need to be met, logically speaking:

Ability to sustainably produce high-oil-yielding algae strains on a large-scale Ability to extract the oil from the algae on a large scale Capability for large-scale conversion of algal oil into biodiesel The first two aspects are specific to algae, while the third is a generic aspect for biodiesel production from all plant oils. Based on the current research inputs, it appears that the real concern would be condition # 1: Capability to sustainably produce high-oil-yielding algae strains on a large-scale. While the other two conditions need to be addressed as well, those two are primarily engineering considerations over which we have more control than over condition #1. This, hence needs to be given more focus. The capability to sustainably produce high-oil-yielding algae strains on a large-scale can again be thought to contain two distinct aspects: (1) Identifying the high-yielding Algal Strains and (2) Identifying the most optimal methods to cultivate them. A good amount of research is taking place in each of these two aspects and it is hoped that there will be more good news soon

Algal Biodiesel Characteristics & Properties

Characteristics of algae biodiesel that differ from petro diesel:
1. 2. 3. Algae biodiesel has virtually no sulfur content. Biodiesel has superior lubricating properties, reducing fuel system wear, and increases the life of fuel injection equipment. Algae biodiesel has more aggressive solvent properties than petro diesel and will dissolve leftover varnish residue. Fuel filters should be changed shortly after introducing biodiesel into systems formerly running on petrodiesel to avoid clogging. Biodiesel has about 5-8 percent less energy density than petrodiesel, but with its higher combustion efficiency and better lubricity to partially compensate, its overall fuel efficiency decrease is only about 2 percent. The cloud point, or temperature at which pure (B100) biodiesel starts to gel, is about 32 F. A blend of B20 (20% biodiesel, 80% petrodiesel) generally does not gel in cold weather. Various additives will lower the gel point of 6. 7. B100. 0 Biodiesel's flash point (lowest temperature at which it can vaporize to form an ignitable mixture in air) is 266 F, significantly higher than petrodiesel's 147 F, or gasoline's 52 F. Biodiesel reduces particulate matter by about 47 percent as compared to petroleum diesel. Biodiesel has less dangerous particulate matter because it reduces the solid carbon fraction on the particulate matter while increasing the amount of oxygen.
0 0 0

4. 5.

Advantages of biodiesel produced from algae:

1. 2. Higher yield and hence hopefully lower cost

The most significant benefit is however in the yield of algal oil, and hence biodiesel. According to some estimates, the yield (per Acre say) of oil from algae is over 200 times the yield from the best-performing plant/vegetable oils. While soybean typically produces less than 50 gallon of oil per acre and rapeseed generates less than 130 gallon per acre, algae can yield up to 10,000 gallons per acre. Algae can grow practically in every place where there is enough sunshine The biodiesel production from algae also has the beneficial by-product of reducing Emissions from power plants, if the algae are grown using exhausts from the power plants. Algae produce a lot of polyunsaturates, which may present a stability problem carbon and NOx

3. 4.

5.

since higher levels of

polyunsaturated fatty acids tend to decrease the stability of biodiesel. But polyunsaturates also have much lower melting points than monounsaturates or saturates, thus algal biodiesel should have much better cold weather properties than many other bio-feedstock. Since one of the disadvantages of biodiesel is their relatively poor performance in cold temperatures, it appears that algal biodiesel might score well on this point.

Research on Biodiesel from Algae

Enhancing lipid production rates by increasing the activity of enzymes via genetic engineering Lipid accumulation in algae typically occurs during periods of environmental stress, including growth under nutrient-deficient conditions. The lipid and fatty acid contents of microalgae vary in accordance with culture conditions. In some cases, lipid content can be enhanced by the imposition of nitrogen starvation or other stress factors. Biochemical studies have also suggested that acetyl-CoA carboxylase (ACCase), a biotin-containing

enzyme that catalyzes an early step in fatty acid biosynthesis, may be involved in the control of this lipid accumulation process. Therefore, it may be possible to enhance lipid production rates by increasing the activity of this enzyme via genetic engineering.

Through

nitrogen

&

phosphorus

deprivation

Induction of Lipid Synthesis by Nutrient Deprivation in Microalgae - In an experiment, microalgal strains were screened in the laboratory for their biomass productivity and lipid content. Four strains (two marine and two freshwater), selected because of their robustness, high productivity and relatively high lipid content, were cultivated under nitrogen deprivation in 0.6-L bubbled tubes. Only the two marine microalgae accumulated lipid under such conditions; they are eustigmatophyte & Nannochloropsis sp. F&M-M24, which attained 60% lipid content after nitrogen starvation. These were subsequently grown in a photobioreactor to study the influence of irradiance and nutrient (nitrogen or phosphorus) deprivation on fatty acid accumulation. Fatty acid content increased with high irradiances (up to 32.5% of dry biomass) and following both nitrogen and phosphorus deprivation (up to about 50%). Further tests proved that under nutrient sufficient and deficient conditions, for specific strains, lipid productivity increased from 117 mg/L/day in nutrient sufficient media (with an average biomass productivity of 0.36 g/L/day and 32% lipid content) to 204 mg/L/day (with an average biomass productivity of 0.30 g/L/day and more than 60% final lipid content) in nitrogen deprived media. In a twophase cultivation process (anutrient sufficient phase to produce the inoculum followed by a nitrogen deprived phase to boost lipid synthesis) the oil production potential could be projected to be more than 90 kg per hectare per day. This is the first report of an increase of both lipid content and areal lipid productivity attained through nutrient deprivation in an outdoor algal culture. The experiments showed that this marine eustigmatophyte has the potential for an annual production of 20 tons of lipid per hectare in the Mediterranean climate and of more than 30 tons of lipid per hectare in sunny tropical areas. (Reference: Title: Microalgae for oil: Strainselection, induction of lipid synthesis and outdoor mass cultivation in a low-cost photobioreactor; University: Dipartimento di Biotecnologie Agrarie, Universit degli Studi di Firenze, Piazzale delle Cascine 24, 50144 Firenze, Italy, Source: Biotechnol Si Depletion Bioeng, - research into diatom lipid 2008 accumulation Jun by silicon 18) depletion

Cyclotella cryptica accumulated more lipid more rapidly after Si depletion. Further studies (by NREL, during the ASP Program) identified two factors that seemed to be at play in this species: Si-depleted cells direct newly assimilated carbon more toward lipid production and less toward carbohydrate production. Si-depleted cells slowly convert non-lipid cell components to lipids. During the ASP research at NREL, the highest lipid content occurred with Navicula, which increased from 22% in exponential phase cells to 49% in Si-deficient cells and to 58% in N-deficient cells. Coomls, et al. reported that the lipid content of the diatom Navioua pelliculosa increased by about 60% during a 14-hour silicon starvation period. Similarly, Werner also reported an increase in cellular lipids during a 24 hours silicon starvation period. The switch from carbohydrate accumulation to lipid these Diatoms occurs very rapidly, though mechanisms involved are not yet fully understood. accumulation in