If the problem with Carbon Dioxide is that simple then simply cooling the exhaust (pollution and all) and using it to supply the basic carbon dioxide to grow biomass using the nutrients as a source to augment the growth would be easier. This is exactly what the Argentineans and Israeli Engineers are doing with the developments of farmed macro algae in shallow lagoons in Buenos Aeries and Ashkelon.

The art of these developments is to store the carbon dioxide in the biomass for as short a period of time as possible (four weeks) harvest the algae and then reduce the biomass to biofuels.

Since the biomass is over 85% cellulose and around 10% hemicellulose – with the remainder being useful chemicals – and the yield of biomass from the 10 harvests per year is equivalent to between 25 and 30 times that of producing ethanol from sugar cane and the system uses salt/brackish water (typical of a power station cooling basin) or it can use clean water.

It is also a matter of an add-on facility that will work at low temperatures using pretty basic engineering technology based on traditional waste-water expertise (with a small add-on) and the use of hybrid macro algae that have been selected through traditional breeding (no GM mods here.)

In the examples I have seen discussed and understand for pricing the returns on investment are likely to exceed 40% and move to a positive cash flow after paying off total debt and borrowing within 5 years. To me this sounds far better than this system highlighted here – or am I missing something?

What happens to the dry ice in this process? Where does it go?

Agnes Baker

Editor, CryoGas International