Bio-Fuels

Bio-Fuels

Introduction

There is an alternative of fossil fuels which are bio fuels such as algae fuels. In algae fuels, algae are used as its natural deposits. Many companies and organizations are focusing to raise the production of algae fuels and make it more valuable to the market. Fossil fuels release CO2 on their burning and in a similar way Harvested algae also produces CO2 when burnt. Every other day brings new ideas and revolutions and technology is getting advanced day by day. Government and private companies are putting efforts on the manufacture of new products.

Because of high oil prices, completion between different products and world food crises has also developed interest in production of algae. It can be used for making vegetable oil, bio diesel, bio ethanol, bio gasoline, bio methanol, bio butane and other bio fuels. It can be cultivated from the land which is not suitable for agriculture. The characteristics of algae fuels include that fresh water resources are not affected by those fuels. They can be produced by using sea water, and waste water. They are non toxic to the environment.

Discussion

Algae Bio-fuels Costs

Algae costs per unit mass in year 2010 were $5000/tone. These fuels operated at high capital and operating costs and provided 10 to 100 times more energy than other crop fuels of this generation. One of the bio fuels company claimed that algae can produce more oil than other fuel crops because algal organism used sunlight to produce lipids or oil. The United States of Energy Department suggested that if algae fuels replaced the petroleum fuels in the country it would require 15000 sq miles which could be the 0.42% of the map of the country and or it can cover half of the land area of Maine. The head of the Algal Biomass Organization suggested that, by 2018 algae fuels would reach its price parity with oil if granted production tax credit.

Bio Diesel

Most research in algal bio fuels production is done in private sector. There are small experiments to observe that algae bio diesel can replace the diesel in all over the world as it algae fuels can produce enough amounts of bio diesel. There is an estimate that if the algae diesel replaces the conventional diesel production of 1.1bn then, it would require a piece of land which is 57.3 million hectares. These conditions are highly favorable with algae bio fuels than other crops fuels. It is estimated that worldwide consumption of bio diesel will be 50 billion liters by 2030 (Johnston, 2007).

Bio Gasoline

In July, 2010 Exxon Mobil and Synthetic Genomics announced to open green house facility in order to do research and testing algae bio fuels. Exxon Mobile and SGI are putting their efforts on research work to consider that large amount of bio fuels may be obtained from algae.

Advantages of Algae Bio Fuels

ExxonMobil has put great efforts to recognize the benefits and rewards of algae bio fuels. It has predicted some benefits such as algae can be produced by ...