Tuesday, July 13, 2010

In praise of the scum of the earth

Green machine: A new push for pond scum power - tech - 12 July 2010 - New Scientist

New Scientist reports on why making biofuel from algae seems to be a good idea, but also notes the problems. On the one hand:
"Ten million hectares of algae could supply all US transportation fuel," says Greg Mitchell of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. That's less than 3 per cent of the area farmed in the US – and algae can live in seawater in the desert.
On the other hand, the penultimate paragraph takes quite a lot of the gloss off the concept:
And ultimately, production will require suitable climate, land, water, nutrients and CO2, all at one site. Even using waste land, seawater, sewage and smokestack CO2, Benemann thinks this will limit the potential for algal biomass to the equivalent of 1 per cent of the CO2 now being released, or less. "But that's still a gargantuan amount. Let's hope we can do that much."
Hmm. Not exactly going to save the Earth, then; but maybe can make a worthwhile contribution?

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