Algae expert calls LiveFuels' biofuel-from-fish approach not 'impossible'

One of the world's leading algae experts says a new biofuel-from-fish approach pursued by algae innovator LiveFuels seems at least plausible.

Dr. John Benemann, one of the authors of a seminal U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory report from 1998 on biofuel from algae and an
internationally-recognized bioenergy expert said he thinks LiveFuels is “in as good of shape as anybody” to make its R&D happen.

“Nobody has a shovel-ready project,” he told the Cleantech Group today.

He said LiveFuels’ process overcomes major problems of harvesting and processing the algae. But the downside is that the company still has to make the process efficient, and it becomes more complicated growing two species—the algae and the fish—than one.

“Two impossible things are more impossible than one impossible thing,” Benemann said, who is also a consultant to LiveFuels.

However, he said the filter-feeding fish do “a pretty good job” harvesting the algae, metabolizing it and storing oil.

San Carlos, Calif.-based LiveFuels is hoping to develop biofuels from algae—squeezing the liquid fuel out of fish by feeding them algae for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

In fact, the fish eat more than one-third of their body weight in wet algae per day, filtering seven gallons per minute, CEO Lissa Morgenthaler-Jones said today.

The process doesn’t require electricity and has the potential to clean up ocean pollution.

While LiveFuels had previously described its business as pursuing oil extraction directly from the algae themselves, extracting it now from fish is a process the company has been exploring practically since it was founded, Morgenthaler-Jones said.

LiveFuels announced yesterday it has started a pilot facility in Brownsville, Texas. The facility—which includes 45 acres of open saltwater ponds on repurposed fish/shrimp farming land—is expected to be used to research optimizing algal productivity and increasing the rates of conversion of biomass into renewable oils.

The company had previously been operating on 150 acres in California, about an hour north of the Mexican border, but found that desert conditions weren’t optimal for growing algae. The Texas water also comes from shipping channels, so it is seawater Morgenthaler-Jones said.

Many algae-to-biofuel companies grow algae in open fresh water ponds or expensive bioreactors or centrifuges, which require electricity.

“We figured out awhile ago that was too expensive to do,” Morgenthaler-Jones said.

Some detractors have said biofuel from algae cannot be economically feasible. Others have argued that much has changed since the NREL report was written, and that the costs of algae production, much like other technologies over time, have dropped (see Biofuel from algae on horizon, say experts).

Morgenthaler-Jones said LiveFuels has been taking a different direction since 2006, growing the algae in what the company said is low-cost, saltwater ponds, feeding the algae to tiny, filter-feeding fish and other aquatic herbivores and then processing them for renewable oils and other valuable products such as omega-3 fatty acids.

The oil would then be “handed off to the petroleum guys,” Morgenthaler-Jones said.

“Fish need 1/800th of the energy of a centrifuge to process algal water,” she said, adding that as a bonus, the fish do the lipid conversion themselves.

She said the company hasn’t yet heard any opposition to its process from groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, but some are already voicing their opposition (see LiveFuels to Farm Fish to Make Biofuel = Bad Idea).

The results of the Brownsville research are expected to be used to expand to a full-scale commercial operation along the coast of Louisiana.

In the near future, Morgenthaler-Jones said the company is looking to achieve 5,000 pounds of fish per acre, eventually getting to an intermediate stage of 25,000 pounds per acre. It’s unclear, she said, whether that intermediate stage would happen in Texas, or on reclaimed bayou land in Louisiana, for which the company is currently scouting.

LiveFuels said the commercial facilities would be designed to harness agricultural pollution flowing from the Mississippi River, which can be used as nutrients for generating algal blooms. In removing it from the river, LiveFuels said it would also mitigate the impacts of agricultural pollution in the open ocean.

LiveFuels has filed 10 U.S. patents to date for its approach to growing and harvesting algal biomass.

In 2007, LiveFuels raised $10 million in its Series A round, led by David Gelbaum of the Quercus Trust—a major donor to conservation advocacy and environmental organizations. The Gelbaum family itself contributed the lion's share of the money (see LiveFuels kicks it up).

Morgenthaler-Jones said the company’s original budget was $45 million, but it could come in under budget. She said its Series B fundraising will be starting in the next few months.

LiveFuels isn't the first to be exploring biofuel from such unconventional aquatic feedstocks. Professor David Brune, previously at South Carolina-based Clemson University in the agricultural and biological department, had been working on a similar approach before recently leaving the university.

Brune and his students were experimenting with a novel way to extract oil from algae using brine shrimp. Trials showed that brine shrimp, feeding on micro algae, could produce up to 500 gallons of biodiesel per acre per year with little environmental waste. Brune did not return a request for comment.

Another company, KentBioEnergy in Southern California also tried to get tilapia to eat the algae, but was unsuccessful because it used the wrong species of algae.

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