dissertaton benoît robart - msc. environmental entrepreneurship

Assessing the business opportunities for

microalgae technologies as a means of

reducing carbon emissions.

By Benoît Robart

A dissertation submitted by Benoît Robart to the Department of Civil and Environmental

Engineering, University of Strathclyde, in part completion of the requirements for the MSc in

Environmental Entrepreneurship.

I, Benoît Robart, hereby state that this report is my own work and that all sources used are

made explicit in the text.

Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Roberts

Number of words (excluding tables, appendices, and references): 16065

August 2014

ii

Benoît Robart – MSc. in Environmental Entrepreneurship 2013-2014

The copyright of this dissertation belongs to the author under the terms of the United

Kingdom Copyright Acts as qualified by University of Strathclyde Regulation 3.49. Due

acknowledgement must always be made of the use of any material contained in, or derived

from, this dissertation.

iii


Abstract

Purpose of the research

Humankind must act now to address the problem of global warming initiated by

anthropogenic emissions of Green-house gases like CO2. Microalgae could be used to

mitigate CO2 emissions. Microalgae are micro-organisms which transform CO2 and nutrients

into biomass through the process of photosynthesis, like plants. However, microalgae are ten

to fifty times more efficient at capturing CO2 than plants. 1.8kg of CO2 is required to produce

1kg of microalgal biomass. Therefore, they have the potential to capture CO2 from flue gas or

from the atmosphere and to reduce the net carbon emissions into the atmosphere. This

dissertation attempts to assess business opportunities for microalgae-based solutions to

mitigate carbon emissions.

Methodology

A qualitative research was undertaken, based on a literature review and on interviews of

experts in this field (N=9) both from research background and from business background. The

literature review covered the techniques to produce and harvest microalgal biomass, the

potential for microalgae-based carbon capture from flue gas, and the business opportunities

for microalgae-based technologies. Data collected in the literature review and during the

interviews were compared together and analyzed to identify a list of findings and

recommendations for future practice.

Findings and conclusion

It was found that a combination of several business opportunities was often recommended for

a microalgae-based business to be profitable. Save for production of nutraceuticals and

chemical compounds out of microalgae, which are very profitable products already.

Microalgae enable to reduce carbon emissions, as (1) they feed on CO2 to grow, either it is

CO2 from flue gas or from the atmosphere, and (2) microalgae by-products would have emit

more CO2 during their life if they had been produced with fossil-fuel-based solutions. The

drivers and opportunities for this field have been found to be (1) carbon taxes and subsidies

from governments, (2) R&D, especially in genetics and (3) acceptance by people that

microalgae can be used to make products for everyday life.

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Acknowledgements

I want to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Jennifer Roberts, for her patient guidance

and her sense of details in her feedbacks on my work. She helped me learn and improve

myself during the whole process of writing this dissertation.

Also, I want to thank Dr Elsa João, for her valuable comments on my proposal and her choice

of supervisor for my dissertation.

I want to thank all the nine participants to the interviews, for their invaluable insights on my

topic and their availability. I am sincerely grateful to them for sharing their culture and up-to-

date knowledge with me, and for tolerating my strong French accent during our discussions.

Also, I express my gratitude to Andrea, who evocated algae-based biofuel during a

discussion. He gave me the idea to investigate deeper into this topic and to pursue my

dissertation in a related area.

I want to specially thank Aline for her priceless advice on communication and for staying at

my side during this time of stress that is the dissertation writing.

I want to thank my friends who supported me during the writing of this thesis: Samir,

Guislaine, Pierre, Gurkan, Daniele, Timothy, and Boom.

Finally, I want to thank my parents for believing in me and for giving me their support during

this summer spent at writing this dissertation far from them.

v


Contents

Abstract ..................................................................................................................................... iii

Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................... iv

List of figures ............................................................................................................................. 1

List of tables ............................................................................................................................... 3

List of abbreviations ................................................................................................................... 4

Glossary ...................................................................................................................................... 6

1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 7

1.1. Background of the research ............................................................................................. 7

1.1.1. The situation – the needs for technologies reducing carbon emissions .................... 7

1.1.2. The potential of microalgae to sequestrate carbon dioxide....................................... 9

1.2. Goals of the research ....................................................................................................... 9

1.3. Structure of the dissertation ........................................................................................... 10

2. Microalgae: an overview ...................................................................................................... 11

2.1. What are microalgae and why are they important? ....................................................... 11

2.1.1. What are algae? ....................................................................................................... 11

2.1.2. How can microalgae act as carbon sink .................................................................. 12

2.1.3. Some microalgae species and their characteristics ................................................. 13

2.2. Technologies to grow microalgae .................................................................................. 14

2.2.1. Open ponds ............................................................................................................. 14

2.2.2. Closed systems ........................................................................................................ 17

2.2.3. Comparison of these two technologies for large-scale commercial production ..... 19

2.3. Technologies to harvest microalgae .............................................................................. 20

3. Carbon capture and storage and applicability to algae-based technologies ......................... 23

3.1. What does (non-algae-based) ―Carbon Capture and Storage‖ mean and what is

currently being done? ........................................................................................................... 23

3.1.1. Definition of ―Carbon Capture and Storage‖ .......................................................... 23

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3.1.2. Step 1 - carbon capture............................................................................................ 23

3.1.3. Step 2 - transport ..................................................................................................... 24

3.1.4. Step 3 - storage ........................................................................................................ 25

3.1.5. Bio-CCS – Classic CCS combined with biofuels combustion ............................... 25

3.2. Opportunities for Algae-based carbon capture .............................................................. 26

3.2.1. Introduction ............................................................................................................. 26

3.2.2. Using microalgae to capture CO2 from power plants flue gas ................................ 26

3.2.3. Potential for CO2 capture by microalgae ................................................................ 28

4. Business opportunities in the field of microalgae ................................................................ 33

4.1. Introduction ................................................................................................................... 33

4.2. Microalgae for biofuel production ................................................................................. 34

4.2.1. Why microalgae-based biofuel?.............................................................................. 34

4.2.2. Technical and economic aspects of making biofuels with microalgae ................... 36

4.3. Microalgae used to treat waste water ............................................................................ 37

4.4. What can be done with algae biomass ........................................................................... 40

4.4.1. Fertilizers ................................................................................................................ 40

4.4.2. Human food industry, pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals .................................... 40

4.4.3. Animal food industry .............................................................................................. 42

4.4.4 Other business opportunities and algae-based technologies being developed ......... 43

4.5. Conclusion of the literature review ............................................................................... 44

5. Methodology of the dissertation ........................................................................................... 46

5.1. Introduction ................................................................................................................... 46

5.2. Conducting qualitative research .................................................................................... 47

5.2.1. Conducting qualitative research .............................................................................. 47

5.2.2. Semi-structured interviews ..................................................................................... 48

5.3. Questions ....................................................................................................................... 49

5.4. Identification of the potential interviewee ..................................................................... 50

5.5. Analysis ......................................................................................................................... 51

6. Findings and analysis of the results ...................................................................................... 53

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6.1. Objective 1 – To investigate the technical and financial aspects of growing microalgae

.............................................................................................................................................. 53

6.1.1. Growing microalgae - Open ponds versus photobioreactors .................................. 53

6.1.2. Production costs and profitability ........................................................................... 55

6.1.3. Recommendations ................................................................................................... 56

6.2. Objective 2 – To investigate the potential of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions

from flue gas ......................................................................................................................... 56

6.2.1. Findings and analysis .............................................................................................. 56


6.3. Objective 3 – To identify the main opportunities and challenges for the development of

microalgae-based technologies ............................................................................................ 59



6.4. Objective 4 – To investigate the potential of microalgae-based biofuel to mitigate

carbon emissions, and as an alternative to fossil fuel in the Future .................................... 61



6.5. Objective 5 – To explore activity in the field of microalgae today and to identify

profitable business opportunities in the field of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions . 64

6.5.1. Growing microalgae reduces net CO2 emissions .................................................... 64

6.5.2. Food production ...................................................................................................... 65

6.5.3. Other business opportunities ................................................................................... 65

6.5.4. Combination of business opportunities ................................................................... 67


7. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 69

7.1. Summary of key findings and recommendations for future practice ............................ 69

7.2. Limitations ..................................................................................................................... 71

7.3. What further research could be done ............................................................................. 71

7.4. Concluding the dissertation ........................................................................................... 72

Table of references ................................................................................................................... 73

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Appendix I – Information sheet for interview .......................................................................... 83

Appendix II – Consent form for interview ............................................................................... 86

Appendix III – Questions for interview and format ................................................................. 88

Appendix IV – Information sheet for questionnaire ................................................................ 92

Appendix V – Consent form for questionnaire ........................................................................ 95

Appendix VI – Questionnaire .................................................................................................. 97

Appendix VII – Advertisement .............................................................................................. 101

Appendix VIII – Advertising Email/cover letter .................................................................... 102

Appendix IX – Answers to the interviews ............................................................................. 103

Interview 1 - Rhona ............................................................................................................ 103

Interview 2 - Robert ............................................................................................................ 105

Interview 3 - Brennan ......................................................................................................... 108

Interview 4 - Prakash .......................................................................................................... 110

Interview 5 – Kyle .............................................................................................................. 112

Interview 6 – Raphaël ......................................................................................................... 114

Interview 7 - Barrack .......................................................................................................... 116

Interview 8 – Ryan ............................................................................................................. 118

Interview 9 - Paulo ............................................................................................................. 120

1


List of figures

Figure 1.1.1.a. The greenhouse effect (CO2CRC, 2014) ........................................................... 7

Figure 1.1.1.b. Cumulative total anthropogenic CO2 emissions from 1870 and in the Future, as

forecasted by the IPCC (2013a) ................................................................................................. 8

Figure 2.1.1. A sample of microalgae under the microscope (Qualitas, 2014) ........................ 11

Figure 2.1.2. Tubes of culture after the experiment: one was bubbled normal air (on the left –

culture is less dense) and the other one was bubbled air with additional CO2 (culture is denser)

(Packer, 2009) .......................................................................................................................... 12

Figure 2.2.1.a. Example of open-pond systems (Spath and Mann, 2002) ............................... 15

Figure 2.2.1.b. Example of circular algal pond with rotating agitator in Taiwan (Becker, 1994)

.................................................................................................................................................. 15

Figure 2.2.1.c. Example of open-pond for large-scale production, with several raceways,

adapted from Demirbas and Demirbas (2010) ......................................................................... 16

Figure 2.2.1.d. Aerial view of spiral algal pond at Lake Texoco in Mexico (Becker, 1994) ... 16

Figure 2.2.2.a. Example of tubular PBR system (algae-energy, 2014) .................................... 18

Figure 2.2.2.b. Vertical column photobioreactors at the MIT (Roidroid, 2007) ...................... 18

Figure 2.2.2.c. Mechanism of a flat-plate photobioreactor (Newman, 2008) .......................... 19

Figure 3.2.3.a. Schematic process of microalgae-based carbon capture from power plants

(Powerplantsccs, 2014) ............................................................................................................ 29

Figure 3.2.3.b. Global distribution of some companies having projects related to microalgae-

based carbon capture from flue gas (Powerplantsccs, 2014) ................................................... 31

Figure 3.2.3.c. Combination of carbon capture with microalgae farm and classic CCS of the

biofuels produced by the microalgae........................................................................................ 32

Figure 4.1. The different products that can be made out of micro-algae, adapted from

Reissman (2013) ....................................................................................................................... 33

Figure 4.2.2. Diagram showing expected trends for the evolution of prices for petroleum and

algal oil production and enlightening the fact that if the trends go on, algal oil will become

cheaper than petroleum at some point (on creation) ................................................................ 37

Figure 4.3.a. Schematic diagram showing the concept of utilizing microalgae production for

combined waste water treatment and biogas fabrication to power the water treatment plant,

adapted from Craggs et al. (2012) ............................................................................................ 39

2


Figure 4.3.b. Photograph of one of the 1.25-ha algal ponds with an algal harvester (Craggs et

al., 2012) ................................................................................................................................... 39

Figure 4.4.4. Algae-powered streetlamp of Pierre Calleja (Calleja, 2013) .............................. 43

Figure 6.4.1. Sustainable cycle of microalgae-based biofuel production and combustion (on

creation) .................................................................................................................................... 63

Figure 6.5.1. Diagram illustrating reduction in net CO2 emissions in the atmosphere by

producing by-products out of algal biomass (on creation) ....................................................... 64

Figure 6.5.5. Arranged SADT presenting the whole process of growing microalgae with

business opportunities spoken of in the research (on creation) ………………………………68

3


List of tables

Table 2.1.3. Growth characteristics for some algae strains adapted from Li et al. (2006)....... 14

Table 2.2.2. Main types of photobioreactors, adapted from Ugwu et al. (2008)………….18

Table 2.2.3. Comparison between open ponds and closed systems for microalgae culture .... 20

Table 2.3. Summary of biomass recovery options adapted from Li et al. (2006) .................... 22

Table 3.1.2. List of the three major options to capture CO2 from the flue gas created by the

combustion of fossil fuel. ......................................................................................................... 24

Table 3.1.4. List of available options for carbon storage ......................................................... 25

Table 3.2.3. Comparison between microalgae-based carbon sequestration versus classic CCS,

adapted from Powerplantsccs (2014) ....................................................................................... 30

Table 4.2.2. Different types of microalgae-based biofuels and their manufacturing process,

adapted from Chisti (2007), Brennan and Owende (2010), Mata et al. (2010), Amaro et al.

(2012) and Powerplantccs (2014) ............................................................................................ 36

Table 4.3. Advantages and drawbacks of combining waste water treatment with microalgae

production, adapted from Benemann and Pedroni (2007), Park et al. (2011), and Craggs et al.

(2012), ...................................................................................................................................... 38

Table 4.4.2.a. Non-exhaustive list of microalgal species with some of their potential

downstream applications, adapted from Borowitzka (1999), Spolaore et al. (2006), Chisti

(2007), Wang et al. (2010), and Ho et al., (2011) .................................................................... 41

Table 4.4.2.b. Some company names with the substances they extract from microalgae for

their food- or drug-related industry, adapted from Pulz and Gross (2004) .............................. 42

Table 4.5. Summary of the advantages of microalgae for business applications to mitigate

CO2 emissions .......................................................................................................................... 45

Table 5.2.1. Comparison between the main types of interviews, adapted from Langley (1987)

and Burns (2000) ...................................................................................................................... 48

Table 5.4. List of respondents with details regarding their activity and expertise ................... 51

Table 7.1. Summary of key findings and recommendations for each objective …………69

4


List of abbreviations

Air Separation Unit

ASU

Australian Dollar

A$

Carbon Capture and Storage

CCS

Carbon dioxide removal

CDR

Chlorofluorocarbon

CFC

Methane

CH4

Carbon dioxide

CO2

Enhanced Oil Recovery

EOR

European Union

EU

Flue-gas Desulphurization

FGD

Greenhouse Gases

GHG

Gigawatt Hour GWh

Hydrogen

H2

Mercury

Hg

5


Micrometre

μm

Megawatt

MW

Nitric Oxides

NOx

Oxygen

O2

Parts per million

ppm

Photobioreactor

PBR

Research and Development

R&D

Representative Concentration Pathway

RCP

Structured Analysis and Design Technique

SADT

Sulphur Oxides

SOx

Species

sp.

United States dollar US$

United States of America

USA

Ton

t

6


Glossary

1 Parts per million (ppm): Unit which applies for very dilute concentrations of substance. Just

as one percent is one part out of cent, one ppm is one part out of one million. Thus, the units

mg/ton or mL/m3 are examples of ppm units.

2 Net Present Value (NPV): The NPV of a project is the sum of net cash inflows (incomes and

outcomes) over the years, divided by a discount rates which takes into account the time value

of money, the interest rates, the risks and uncertainty of future cash flows.

3 Acre: Surface unit - 1 acre = 0.405 hectare = 4047 m

2

3 Nutraceutical: The term nutraceutical refers to products which supposedly provide health

benefits and which are derived from food sources.

4 Lignocellulosic biomass: refers to naturally occurring terrestrial plants like trees, bushes,

grass, waste biomass and non-food crops

5 Eutrophication: The term eutrophication here refers to the saturation of a water body with

nutrients, which leads to radical changes in the ecological balance: decreased percentage of

dissolved O2, new species invasion, decreased biodiversity, and toxicity are some of the

symptoms of eutrophication.

6 Profit margin:

7 SADT (Structured Analysis and Design Technique): methodology to describe a process with

identification of inputs, process and its function(s), and outputs.

7


1. Introduction

1.1. Background of the research

1.1.1. The situation – the needs for technologies reducing carbon emissions

Data show that global mean temperatures of the atmosphere and ocean have been increasing

for 150 years, reaching unprecedented records over the last 2000 years (IPCC, 2013b). This

on-going phenomenon is known as global warming. Anthropogenic emissions of Greenhouse

Gases (GHGs) are probably the major cause of it (Huntley and Redalje, 2007).

GHGs are gases like water vapour, CO2, Methane (CH4), Nitric oxides (NOx), sulphur oxides

(SOx) and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). They contribute to the greenhouse effect which causes

the atmosphere to retain heat (Lashof and Ahuja, 1990): when sunrays reach the atmosphere,

part of their energy is absorbed by the atmosphere and released as heat (infrared radiation).

GHGs act like a blanket and the more GHGs there are in the atmosphere, the more energy will

be absorbed from the sun and turned into heat by the atmosphere, warming the earth (EPA,

2014). This phenomenon is illustrated by figure 1.1.1.a.

Figure 1.1.a. The greenhouse effect (CO2CRC, 2014)

8


CO2 is considered as the most noxious GHG, as its emissions account for approximately 80%

of the volume of GHGs produced by human activity (Lashof and Ahuja, 1990; EIA, 2011)).

As figure 1.1.1.b. shows, cumulative total emission of CO2 and global mean temperature are

approximately linearly related. Reduction of CO2 emission is therefore a priority in the fight

against global warming.

Figure1.1.b. Cumulative total anthropogenic CO2 emissions from 1870 and in the Future, as forecasted by

the IPCC (2013a)

Technologies using renewable energies to produce electricity are being developed, as the

major sources of CO2 emissions are fossil-fuel-fired power plants. These technologies are

becoming more efficient and less expensive to implement, but still lots of improvements are

required in this field. Meanwhile, emissions of GHGs from the combustion of fossil fuel keep

increasing and are forecasted to exponentially increase in the next decades if nothing is done

to mitigate these emissions (IPCC, 2013b). For now, the IPCC targets stabilization of CO2

concentration in the atmosphere at between 350 and 450 ppm1. But this can only be done if all

solutions to capture mitigate net carbon emissions in the atmosphere are investigated.

9


1.1.2. The potential of microalgae to sequestrate carbon dioxide

Before so many GHGs were emitted in the atmosphere by human activity, the biosphere was

able to regulate CO2 in the atmosphere by itself. Even today, still approximately one third of

total carbon emissions per year are absorbed by the biosphere, which accounts for about 250

billion tons of CO2 (Socolow et al., 2004). More than half of these carbon emissions are

absorbed by the ocean thanks to organisms like microalgae.

Microalgae are micro-organisms which use photosynthesis chemical reaction to grow.

Photosynthesis turns carbon dioxide (CO2) into Oxygen (O2) and organic matter (Janssen,

2002). Moreover, they are made of about 50% of carbon (Putt, 2007) and are very efficient in

the process of photosynthesis: under good conditions, they can grow exponentially and their

weight can double within a day (Goodall, 2009). In addition, the sources of CO2 that

microalgae can capture carbon from are typically the atmosphere, flue gas from power plants

or industrial processes, and soluble carbonates (Wang et al., 2008). So microalgae have

potential for carbon capture.

In addition, microalgae can be used for several valuable activities at the same time, such as

biofuel production, carbon dioxide fixation from flue gas, production of valuable by-products

like food, feed, or fertilizer, and wastewater treatment at the same time. Therefore they offer a

potentially highly efficient tool for anthropogenic carbon emissions mitigation (Wang et al.,

2008).

1.2. Goals of the research

The dissertation presents an overview of the technologies and innovations in the field of

microalgae as a way to mitigate carbon emissions. The main goal is to assess the business

opportunities for microalgae-based technologies to mitigate carbon emissions. This is

done using two sources of data: literature review (secondary data), and interviews (primary

data).

To do answer the research question, five objectives were identified and answered during this

research:

Objective 1 – To investigate the technical and financial aspects of growing

microalgae

10


Objective 2 – To investigate the potential of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions

from flue gas

Objective 3 – To identify the main opportunities and challenges for the development of

microalgae-based technologies

Objective 4 – To investigate the potential of microalgae-based biofuel to mitigate

carbon emissions, and as an alternative to fossil fuel in the Future

Objective 5 – To explore activity in the field of microalgae today and to identify

profitable business opportunities in the field of microalgae to mitigate carbon

emissions

Answers to these objectives will enrich current database on microalgae-based technologies

and business opportunities to mitigate carbon emissions, and provide this database with up-to-

date information. The researcher used his background in Mechanical Engineering and his

knowledge acquired through his academic year at Strathclyde University in the MSc. of

Environmental Entrepreneurship to lead this research.

1.3. Structure of the dissertation

This thesis is divided into several chapters. The first three chapters are the summary of the

literature review made by the researcher:

Chapter 2 explains what microalgae are and how they are grown and harvested

Chapter 3 presents how microalgae can be used to capture CO2 from industry flue

gases and compares carbon capture with microalgae to classic Carbon Capture and

Storage (CCS)

Chapter 4 draws an overview of business opportunities for entrepreneurs in the field of

microalgae

Following the literature review, chapter 5 explains the methodology of research for this

dissertation and in particular how primary data collection and analysis are handed out. Finally,

Chapter 6 presents the findings and analyses data gathered during this research, before a

conclusion is made in chapter 7, with a summary of key findings and recommendations for

future practice.

11


2. Microalgae: an overview

This chapter explains what microalgae are, and explores technics used to grow and

harvest microalgal biomass.

2.1. What are microalgae and why are they important?

2.1.1. What are algae?

Algae are a very large family of organisms, whose size vary between a few micrometres and

more than 50 metres for some species of giant alga like the giant kelp (Algae Biomass

Organization, 2014a). They belong to the kingdom of Protista, which regroups all organisms

that do not belong in any other five kingdoms (Becker, 1994).

Two categories of algae can be distinguished: microalgae and macroalgae. Macroalgae (more

commonly called ―seaweed‖) are complex multicellular organisms, while microalgae are a

family of unicellular or simple multi-cellular fast-growing micro-organisms (Graham and

Wilcox, 2008). Microalgae started to arouse the interest in the beginning of the 20st century

and though more than 50,000 strains of microalgae have been identified yet, only a few

thousands of them have been studied so far (Deng et al., 2009; Brennen and Owende, 2011).

Microalgae are very interesting organisms for carbon capture. Through the process of

photosynthesis (see 1.1.2), they are capable of capturing CO2 at efficiency 10 to 50 times

faster than that of terrestrial plants (Li et al., 2008). A sample of microalgae under the

microscope can be seen on figure 2.1.1 below.

Figure 2.1.1. A sample of microalgae under the microscope (Qualitas, 2014)

12


Most microalgae grow with CO2, sunlight and nutrients through the process of

photosynthesis. These microalgae are called autotrophic microalgae. Some microalgae can

grow in the dark, using starch or sugar, through a process of fermentation. These microalgae

are called heterotrophic microalgae. This research focuses on autotrophic microalgae, which

require gaseous or aqueous CO2 to grow (Xu et al., 2006; Shamzi et al., 2011).

2.1.2. How can microalgae act as carbon sink

Microalgae are champions for capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. They contain a

high percentage of carbon: 50% of their mass is made of carbon (Putt, 2007). Approximately

1.8 kg of CO2 is required to provide enough carbon to grow 1 kg of microalgae (Becker,

1994; Sudhakar et al., 2011). This characteristic is combined with a very fast growth: under

good conditions, microalgae can grow exponentially and their weight can double within a day

(Goodall, 2009). These characteristics led several scientists and entrepreneurs to consider

using microalgae to act as carbon sink, to mitigate carbon emissions, as will be explained in

the next chapters.

A solution will be investigated in particular in chapter 3, which consists in injecting directly

flue gases from power plants or other CO2 emitting industries into microalgae farms. One of

the numerous characteristics of microalgae is that they bloom in an environment with a high

concentration of CO2. A laboratory experiment shows that under the same condition of

growth, an environment with more dissolved CO2 leads to a better development of microalgae

than an environment with no additional CO2 (figure 2.1.2).

Figure 2.1.2. Tubes of culture after the experiment: one was bubbled normal air (on the left – culture is

less dense) and the other one was bubbled air with additional CO2 (culture is denser) (Packer, 2009)

13


Not only are microalgae very efficient at converting CO2 into biomass, but they are very

tolerant to high concentrations of CO2 and pollutants in their environment too (Graham and

Wilcox, 2008; Lee, 2009). Chapter 3 will investigate further on the viability of using

microalgae to capture carbon from industrial flue gas.

Apart from carbon capture from flue gases, microalgae can be used as an alternative solution

to produce services or goods like recycling of waste water, biofuel, plastics, food and

fertilizers, whose production would have emitted more CO2 into the atmosphere otherwise

(Benemann and Pedroni, 2007). These applications will be investigated in more details in

chapters 3 and 4.

2.1.3. Some microalgae species and their characteristics

Strains are chosen based on several criteria, among which yielding, percentage of oil,

harvestability, and tolerance to temperature extremes and to pollutants (Benemann, 2008).

For example, if one wants to put emphasis on the ability of microalgae to capture carbon

dioxide from flue gas, the strains should fill the following criteria (Ono and Cuello, 2003;

Brennan and Owende, 2010):

Tolerance to high CO2 concentrations

Tolerance to pollutants and trace elements in flue gas

Tolerance to high temperatures

Ability to capture CO2

Efficiency at capturing light

Below is a table summarising the growth characteristics of some strains of microalgae (Table

2.1.3). Each strain has its own advantages and drawbacks and therefore the optimal strain can

be selected from the large range of criteria and microalgae species available, depending on the

purpose of the production.

14


Table 2.1.3. Growth characteristics for some algae strains adapted from Li et al. (2006)

Among the species of microalgae already studied by researchers, Chlorella, Spirulina and

Dunaliella fill the criteria for carbon capture from flue gas, and they have commercial values

too (Ono and Cuello, 2003; Li et al., 2006). They can therefore be used for two kinds of

money incomes: carbon capture from flue gas and use of biomass through the manufacturing

of by-products.

Microalgae farming therefore have interesting prospects and potential. But the question is:

how do you commercially grow and harvest microalgae?

2.2. Technologies to grow microalgae

2.2.1. Open ponds

Microalgae are almost exclusively cultivated on land. Two families of options are being used

to cultivate autotrophic microalgae: open ponds and closed systems (photobioreactors).

The most common systems to grow micro-algae are open ponds (figures 2.2.1.a and 2.2.1.b).

There are two types of artificial open ponds: raceways, which look like a race track; and

circular ponds. The depth of an open pond is between 15 cm and 40 cm and water is

circulated thanks to a mechanical system (e.g. a paddle wheel), which enables the microalgae

and the nutrients to be mixed and uniformly exposed to sunlight, and which forces microalgae

to stay in suspension and not to sink to the bottom of the pond (Becker, 1994; Li et al., 2006).

15


Figure 2.2.1.b. Example of circular algal pond with rotating agitator in Taiwan (Becker, 1994)

Some open ponds with several tracks are designed for large scale production, as can be seen

on figures 2.2.1.c and 2.2.1.d.

Figure 2.2.1.a. Example of open-pond systems (Spath and Mann, 2002)

16


Figure 2.2.1.d. Aerial view of spiral algal pond at Lake Texoco in Mexico (Becker, 1994)

Open ponds are the cheapest solution to build and operate. This technology is mature and

widely used, and therefore is the most economical solution for large-scale production of

microalgae, provided some conditions are filled (Borowitzka, 1999; Li et al., 2006):

An abundant supply of water or waste water must be available.

Weather is important: Relative humidity is key factor (too low humidity rate results in

evaporation and too high humidity rate can result in overheating of the water).

Precipitation rate is very important too (high precipitation rates may cause dilution and

loss of biomass).

Indeed, the biggest disadvantage of open ponds is that they are exposed to open air. Not only

are they subject to rainfalls and evaporation and their productivity is dependent on the

Figure 2.2.1.c. Example of open-pond for large-scale production, with several raceways,

adapted from Demirbas and Demirbas (2010)

17


weather and the season, but they are prey of invading algae species, grazers, fungi and

amoeba (Demirbas and Demirbas, 2010).

A hybrid solution of open ponds consists in protecting the pond with a transparent covering.

This solution limits the drawbacks due to exposition of the culture to open air, but covering

the pond implies big capital costs and reduction of sunlight which reaches the culture (Li et

al., 2006).

2.2.2. Closed systems

Photobioreactors (PBRs) are systems where microalgae grow within a closed container. This

means that algae are not exposed to the atmosphere, which poses a problem for open systems.

These work as follows (Demirbas and Demirbas, 2010; algae-energy, 2014):

CO2 and nutrients are brought to the containers with a pump, and bubbled into the

culture.

Microalgae are periodically transferred to a degassing zone, where they are bubbled

and ―purified‖ of the O2 produced through photosynthesis.

Heat exchangers allow the temperature within the containers to be regulated day and

night.

All parameters of growth are controlled in a PBR (like temperature, flow rate,

Concentration of CO2, and pH) and thus productivity of PBRs is optimized compared

with open ponds.

Microalgae production can be 5 times more important in PBRs than in open ponds, which

results in a denser culture which facilitates harvesting (Demirbas and Demirbas, 2010; algae-

energy, 2014).

Photobioreactors can take many different shapes and sizes: they can be tubular, panels or bag-

type, inclined vertically or horizontally, and using artificial light or not. These specifications

are dependent on the targets of the activity (research, production of biomass) and on the

resources available.

Table 2.2.2 below draws an overview of the different types of PBRs with their advantages and

drawbacks.

18


Table 2.2.2. Main types of photobioreactors, adapted from Ugwu et al. (2008)

Figures 2.2.2.a, 2.2.2.b and 2.2.2.c illustrate the different kinds of photobioreactors.

Figure 2.2.2.b1. Vertical column photobioreactors at the MIT (Roidroid, 2007)

Figure 2.2.2.a. Example of tubular PBR system (algae-energy, 2014)

19


Figure 2.2.2.c. Mechanism of a flat-plate photobioreactor (Newman, 2008)

Closed systems are globally more expensive than open ponds and require more maintenance

(algae-energy, 2014). They are being developed for high scale production but in the moment,

but today they are mostly used for research, to incubate open ponds, and to grow particular

types of microalgae under ideal conditions (i.e. optimal exposure and invasion from other

organisms avoided) (Ugwu et al., 2008; Benemann, 2008).

2.2.3. Comparison of these two technologies for large-scale commercial

production

Open and closed systems can be compared in terms of costs, productivity, energy-efficiency,

resilience, and possibility to control the growth parameters. Comparison between open-ponds

systems and closed systems tend to show that for large-scale production, open ponds are more

economically viable and more energy efficient, provided conditions are favourable for their

implementation (i.e. good weather conditions, limited probability of invasive species and

contamination, abundant water resources available) (Borowitzka, 1999; Benemann, 2008;

Resurreccion et al., 2012).

Scale-up of PBRs is feasible by increasing the length, the height, the diameter, or the number

of compartments. But as PBRs get bigger, problematics of light exposure, temperature, mass

transfer and mixing are more difficult to overcome (Ugwu et al., 2008).

However, a combination of photobioreactors and open ponds systems seems to be a very

powerful combination presently, as PBRs present a very high productivity and can be used to

produce ―inoculum‖ culture, to seed open ponds to start culture (Benemann, 2008; Schenk et

al., 2008; Demirbas and Demirbas, 2010).

20


A summary of the advantages and drawbacks of each solution has been made in table 2.2.3

below.

Table 2.2.3. Comparison between open ponds and closed systems for microalgae culture

Today, open ponds produce up to 98% the total commercial algae biomass, even for high

value products (Benemann, 2008).

2.3. Technologies to harvest microalgae

Once microalgae are grown, biomass needs to be separated from water, so that it can be

transformed into a valuable product.

The technique used to harvest microalgae depends on its characteristics e.g. density, size and

target product (Olaizola, 2003). This part represents 20-30% of the total production costs of

microalgae biomass (Molina et al., 2003). Harvesting is generally a three stage process:

1. Bulk harvesting, which consists in separating biomass from bulk suspension. For this

step, three main techniques are employed:

a. Flocculation – polymers are added to the solution, to make microalgae

aggregate and form bigger systems to facilitate their extraction (Molina Grima

et al., 2003)

b. Flotation – air is bubbled from the bottom of the system, capturing microalgae

on their way to the surface and thus grouping microalgae in a layer near the

surface. Compared with the previous process, this technique does not require

chemicals to work (Wang et al., 2007)

c. Gravity sedimentation – This process consists in letting gravity operate to

form a layer of microalgae at the bottom (or at the top, depending on their

21


relative density) of the slurry. Though it is a time-consuming process, it is very

efficient and low-cost (Brennan and Owende, 2010)

2. Thickening – this step aims to thicken the bulk. After bulk harvesting step,

concentration of biomass is about 2-7% in the slurry (Brennan and Owende, 2010).

Several methods are used:

a. Centrifugation - Because of Stoke‘s law, settling characteristics of suspended

solids depend on density, radius of microalgae-cells, and on sedimentation

velocity. Centrifugation process is rapid but consumes energy. It can be

combined with flocculation to be more time-efficient (Schenk et al., 2008)

b. Biomass filtration (filter under pressure or suction) can be used for

microalgae larger than 70 μm (Brennan and Owende, 2010)

c. Ultrasonic aggregation can be used to concentrate microalgae. This process

does not induce shear stress on microalgae, which could be damageable for the

potentially high-nutritional value metabolites (Brennan and Owende, 2010)

d. Thermal drying can be used to evaporate water and thicken biomass. It is an

energy-expensive process though (Molina Grima et al., 2003)

3. After these two steps, the concentration of microalgae in the slurry is typically 5-15%

dry solid content and dehydration or drying is needed to concentrate even more the

biomass (depending on what the target product is). Methods that are used include

(Brennan and Owende, 2010):

a. low-pressure shelf drying

b. sun drying (the cheapest method, but requires large drying surface area, good

weather conditions and time)

c. spray drying (commonly used for extraction of high-value products, but more

expensive)

d. fluidised bed drying

e. drum drying

f. and freeze drying (expensive but adapted for e.g. extraction of oil)

Table 2.3 below summarizes advantages and drawbacks of these different harvesting

techniques.

22


Table 2.3. Summary of biomass recovery options adapted from Li et al. (2006)

23


3. Carbon capture and storage and applicability to algae-

based technologies

This chapter starts with an introduction to the classic processes used today for Carbon

Capture and Storage (CCS), before analysing the potential for microalgae to grow in

the adversity of waters bubbled with flue gases and their ability to capture CO2 from

flue gases in this environment. The chapter concludes on the potential of large-scale

carbon capture from flue gas with microalgae.

3.1. What does (non-algae-based) “Carbon Capture and Storage” mean and

what is currently being done?

3.1.1. Definition of “Carbon Capture and Storage”

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is a term which refers to all processes of trapping CO2

emitted during the combustion of fossil fuels or any other chemical, and storing this carbon

dioxide for long time periods so that it is not released to the atmosphere where it would

contribute to anthropogenic climate change (Rackley, 2010). CCS aims to reduce carbon

emissions from large industrial point sources, thus mitigating the impact on the atmosphere

and on global warming induced by carbon dioxide. CCS can reduce up to 90% of CO2

emissions from a site.

CCS is a three-step process: capturing, transporting, and storing CO2; and each of these steps

have their own technological and financial challenges.

3.1.2. Step 1 - carbon capture

To separate and capture carbon dioxide from flue gas, three methods distinguish themselves.

Each of them has their advantages and disadvantages. The table 3.1.2 below draws an

overview of these methods.

24


Table 3.1.2. List of the three major options to capture CO2 from the flue gas created by the combustion of

fossil fuel.

3.1.3. Step 2 - transport

Once captured, CO2 is commonly transported via pipelines, boats, trucks or railway after

compression of the gas (Singh, 2013). But the most common technic is pipelines, as the

development of the oil and gas industry has made gas transportation through pipelines a very

mature technology (Azar et al., 2006; Johnson, 2011).

Other options are being developed to transport CO2, like the storage and transport of CO2 as

an aqueous bicarbonate solution (Chi, 2011). This last solution is interesting as no

compression of CO2 is required to transport CO2 and microalgae have the ability to process

carbon from bicarbonates (Sayre, 2010; Chi, 2011).

Name of the

solution Description Details

Pre-

Combustion

Carbon dioxide is withdrawn from flue

gas before combustion of the

combustible (Rackley, 2010)

Transformation of the fossil fuel into CO2 and

hydrogen (H2). CO2 is captured and H2 is used as a

clean fuel. The main disadvantage of this

technology is the high capital cost (Pires et al.,

2011).

Post-

combustion

Carbon dioxide is withdrawn from flue

gas after combustion of the fossil fuel

(Chou, 2013)

Chemical absorption of CO2 in the fumes by an

amine-solvent is the process the most used in this

category of capture systems. The main costs of this

process come from the recovery of the solvent.

Adsorption, cryogenic distillation and gas-

separation membranes are other solutions for post-

combustion capture systems, but they are

considered even less cost-efficient than the first

one (Stewart and Hessami, 2005; Pires et al.,

2011). The main advantage of post-combustion

capture systems is that they can be used to retrofit

existing power plant or to capture CO2 from

industrial processes (cement and steel factories for

examples) (Chou, 2013)

Oxy-fuel

Like for the post-combustion process,

carbon dioxide is withdrawn from flue

gas after combustion of the fossil fuel,

but combustion is made with a pure

stream of O2, which results in emissions

of almost pure CO2 and water vapour in

the flue gas (Pires et al., 2011).

Because the flue gas contain mainly CO2 and water

vapour, it is easy to condense water to separate it

from CO2. The challenge in this process is to

generate enough O2 for a large scale power plant at

low cost (Rackley, 2010; Pires et al., 2011; Chou,

2013).

25


3.1.4. Step 3 - storage

CCS requires usually that the carbon captured be stored into sinks. The most common

solutions involve injecting CO2 into suitable geological formations deep underground,

although deep ocean storage also shows potential (Rackley, 2010). A listing of different

carbon storage options is shown in Table 3.1.4. However these options could have impacts on

the environment like the modification of the pH of the water for ocean storage, which could

be very damageable to the fragile ocean ecological balance, or other unpredicted impacts

(Stewart and Hessami, 2005).

Table 3.1.4. List of available options for carbon storage

CCS could help reach the stabilization targets of the IPCC (2005), which aim for a

concentration of CO2 within the atmosphere between 350 and 450 ppm. Azar et al. (2006)

identified in an economic appraisal that CCS would allow reaching the IPCC‘s stabilisation

targets of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere over the period 2000-2999 for half the costs of

the solution in which CCS is not used, in terms of Net Present Value2. And this study did not

take into account the potential of bio-CCS and carbon capture with microalgae to mitigate

carbon emissions, which will now be discussed.

3.1.5. Bio-CCS – Classic CCS combined with biofuels combustion

As mentioned earlier (see 1.1.2), microalgae convert nutrients, CO2 and sunlight into oil and

sugar, which can be processed into biofuel (Weber, 2009). The potential for microalgae-

Name of the

solution Description Details

Geological

storage

Sequestration of CO2 into basalt

formations, depleted oil and gas

reserves, deep saline aquifers or

unmineable coal seams (Singh,

2013)

Oil and gas industry provide technological advantages

for this solution as site characterization, injection and

monitoring technologies are very mature. CO2 can be

used to make EOR (Enhanced Oil Recovery) i.e.

injection of CO2 into wells to mix it with oil and

maximize well‘s oil yielding (Rackley, 2010).

Ocean storage

Injection of CO2 into the ocean at

different depths (Stewart and

Hessami, 2005)

CO2 is injected into the ocean and is dissolved or

forms plumes that sink at the bottom of the ocean

(Pires et al., 2011)

Mineral

storage

CO2 is reacted with metal oxides to

form carbonates (Pires et al., 2011)

The process of mineral carbonation occurs naturally

and is slow at ambient temperature (weathering) but

fast at high temperature. However, once stored by

mineral carbonation, CO2 is very stable and there is no

problematic of re-release of CO2 into the atmosphere

with this process (Pires et al., 2011).

26


biofuel will be investigated in the next chapter, but it is interesting to see in this section if

CCS processes which usually are used for fossil fuel combustion can be used to capture CO2

emitted by the combustion of microalgae-based biofuels too. The process in which

microalgae-based biofuel is burnt and then CO2 in flue gas is captured by one of the methods

cited above is called bio-CCS (ZEP, 2012).

In contract to carbon capture from conventional fossil fuel combustion, bio-CCS has potential

to achieve a NET carbon removal from the atmosphere, as CO2 reduction is achieved by

photosynthesis during the formation of biofuel, and CO2 capture and storage of the combusted

biofuel. In Europe, bio-CCS has already entered the EU debates: in the Energy Roadmap

2050 (European Commission, 2011), it is said that not only CCS will have to be applied to all

fossil fuel-fired power plants by 2030 to reach the targets of 80-95% overall decarbonisation

by 2050, but it is recognized that CCS ―combined with biomass could deliver „carbon

negative‟ values‖ (p.12). Bio-CCS has the potential of removing up to 800.106 tons of CO2

from the atmosphere each year in Europe by 2050. This is 50% of the EU power sector

emissions of CO2 and this is without taking into account the reduction of CO2 emissions

induced by the replacement of fossil fuels by biofuels (ZEP, 2012).

According to the Zero Emissions Pole (2012), three key drivers for this process would be the

acceleration of R&D for sustainable microalgae-biofuels, the reward of negative emissions

with European credits, and the awareness-raising of people.

3.2. Opportunities for Algae-based carbon capture

3.2.1. Introduction

Wang et al. (2008) defends the opinion by which using microalgae to capture carbon would

be an economically viable and sustainable solution. Carbon captured using microalgae would

not be sequestrated into the geosphere, but would rather be used to make sustainable by-

products or biofuel, which would then be used as an alternative to fossil fuel (Packer, 2010;

Singh and Olsen, 2011).

3.2.2. Using microalgae to capture CO2 from power plants flue gas

What is interesting with microalgae is that they can directly use flue gas to grow, with no

need for separation of CO2 from the stream and no need for compression (Sahoo et al., 2012).

27


As pure CO2 streams are not needed, no expensive technology in terms of capital costs or

energy consumption is required to separate carbon dioxide from flue gas. It results in a huge

saving of money compared with a classic carbon capture system as described in part 3.1.2.

Fossil fuel-fired power plants emit different gases in their flue gas, like CO2, SOx, NOx, and

traces of heavy metals like Mercury (Hg) (IEA, 2007). Coal-fired power plants emit the most

GHGs compared with gas fired power plants. For example, a typical coal-fired power plant

would emit between 912 and 1280 t/GWh CO2, up to 54 t/GWh SO2 and 4.9 t/GWh NOx, and

up to 70 kg/MWh Mercury (EPA, 2014). But these GHGs in these concentrations which are

produced in abundance by fossil fuel-fired power plants and other industrial plants (like

cement factories) are compatible with the development of algae: as explained in part 2.1.2,

microalgae develop more rapidly in an environment which contains more CO2. Nitric oxides

at their level of concentration in flue gas do not influence the development of microalgae, as it

has been shown in different studies (Maeda et al., 1995; Zeiler et al., 1995; Vunjak-

Novakovic et al., 2005). However, if concentrations of SOx are above 400 ppm in flue gas, it

can lead to a modification of the pH of the culture which can inhibit the normal growth of

microalgae (Maeda et al., 1995; Matsumoto et al., 1997, as cited in Packer, 2009). But such

SOx concentrations are rarely reached in industries‘ gaseous emissions in the EU or in the

USA, as regulations like the Industrial Emissions Directive in the EU (Directive 2010/75/EU)

and the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule in the USA (EPA, 2011) are limiting concentrations of

sulphates in flue gas to less than 400 ppm, which forced industries to install SOx scrubbers

(FGD systems) to control Sulphates emissions in their flue gas already.

Microalgae are very tolerant to chemical modifications of their environment by injection of

flue gas into their cultures. Even, some species like Chlorella grow even better with flue gas

than with pure CO2 at the same percentage (Douskova et al., 2009). Thus, there is an

opportunity for the development of microalgae to capture carbon dioxide (and other pollutants

like nitric oxides) from fossil-fuel fired power plants flue gases, via the direct injection of

these flue gases into the microalgae farms (Doucha et al., 2005; Packer, 2009; Sahoo et al.,

2012; Powerplantccs, 2014).This can apply to other industries as well, as shows the research

from Talec et al. (2013), which concludes that injection of gaseous effluent from cement

industry had no influence over the development of the four species of microalgae tested

during the experiment.

28


Moreover, microalgae have been proved to be very resistant to changes in temperatures and

are tolerant towards high temperatures. For example the microalga Chlorella sp. starts to see

its growth rate slowing down at a temperature of 45°C (Maeda et al., 1995), which is far

above average temperatures of microalgae cultures. And if the species of microalgae is

sensible to high temperatures of flue gases, solutions like heat exchangers can be used to cool

the stream of flue gases while using the heat energy to e.g. dry the biomass (Roidroid, 2007).

From all this, we can say that microalgae are biologically suited to grow in an environment

containing high concentrations of flue gases. But a question remains to be answered: up to

which percentage of CO2 contained in these flue gases can be captured by microalgae farms?

This highly depends on the growth conditions and the environment, but Doucha et al. (2005)

calculated after an experiment that microalgae could capture up to 39% of carbon dioxide

contained in the flue gas of a biogas-fired power plant over one year emission with

microalgae grown in photobioreactors, taking into account the amount of daylight received by

the farms throughout the year. De Morais and Costa (2007) obtained a mean fixation rate of

38% CO2 with Spirulina sp., while the MIT successfully captures 80% carbon in the flue

gases of their boiler room (Roidroid, 2007) and Sayre (2010) reports a carbon fixation rate for

microalgae up to 90% in open ponds.

3.2.3. Potential for CO2 capture by microalgae

As it has just been shown, microalgae are efficient in the process of capturing CO2 from flue

gas. Now the question is: how does it work?

First of all, flue gases are transformed and processed to be partially cleaned of SOx in

a flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) unit.

After that, flue gases go through a drying process, to decrease their concentration in

water vapour,

before being cooled in a heat exchanger, depending on the tolerance of the microalgae

strains to high temperatures.

Gases are then propelled into the microalgae farm thanks to the propeller, assisted by

the aerator and the flow monitor, which is used to adapt the flow rate.

Meanwhile, the waste heat can be used to support the biomass drying process after the

harvesting.

29


After that, flue gases are propelled into the microalgae farms where they are bubbled.

Figure 3.2.3.a provides a schematic view of the process of carbon capture from flue gases

with microalgae.

Figure 3.2.3.a. Schematic process of microalgae-based carbon capture from power plants (Powerplantsccs,

2014)

The main challenges which remain to be addressed for the development of carbon capture

from flue gas with microalgae are the large surface required, and the biomass production costs

which are still a bit high (Benemann, 2008; Sayre, 2010).

In order to be able to capture 80% carbon dioxide emitted in the flue gases of a 200 MWh

gas-fired power plant, 3600 acres3 of microalgae farms would be needed. And the area

required for microalgae farms to capture carbon dioxide from a 200 MWh coal-fired power

plant would be 7000 acres (Sayre, 2010). Such an area is rarely available for construction near

powerful power plants. Smaller areas for smaller processes emitting carbon dioxide in their

flue gases may be easier to find; otherwise, there is the possibility of transporting flue gases

through pipes to the microalgae farms.

30


In 1993, Benemann estimated that US$ 100 was required to capture one ton of CO2 with

microalgae. To reduce the costs, Benemann proposed in 1997 to combine carbon capture from

flue gas with waste water treatment to be even more cost-effective. Other authors propose

estimations of costs for producing microalgae with carbon dioxide from flue gas:

Kadam (1997) who estimates that it would cost US$30/tCO2

Stepan et al. (2002) who estimate that production costs in raceways would be

US$110/ton of dry microalgae biomass (i.e. US$55/tCO2)

Chisti (2007) who estimates that production costs in photobioreactors would be

US$500/ton of dry microalgae biomass (i.e. US$250/tCO2).

Advantages and drawbacks of using microalgae to capture carbon dioxide from flue gas have

been compared with using classic CCS technics in table 3.2.3 below.

Table 3.2.3. Comparison between microalgae-based carbon sequestration versus classic CCS, adapted

from Powerplantsccs (2014)

Carbon capture from flue gas with microalgae presents lots of advantages. The potential for

by-products made out of microalgae will be studied in the next part. Several authors in the

literature say that though the process of capturing carbon from flus gas with microalgae still

needs improvement and development and will need to be more funded by governments, it

looks like a viable process for small-scale flues gases, due to all its advantages economically

speaking in terms of use of biomass, its low environmental impact and the high productivity

of microalgae compared with terrestrial crops (Doucha et al., 2005; Schenk et al., 2008; Vaela

et al., 2009; Sayre, 2010; Sudhakar et al., 2011).

31


Governments and private companies are already investing and having projects in the field of

capturing CO2 in flue gas with microalgae. Especially in the United States. Figure 3.2.3.b

below shows some companies names with their implantation in the world.

Figure 3.2.3.b. Global distribution of some companies having projects related to microalgae-based carbon

capture from flue gas (Powerplantsccs, 2014)

Other opportunities for carbon capture with microalgae are being developed with for example

the idea of Chi (2011) to transform CO2 from flue gas into bicarbonates which can then be

used as a source of carbon for the production of microalgae. This could be an alternative

solution to the problematic of area availability around the fossil fuel-fired power plants to

implement microalgae farms. Nevertheless, processes like this are still in the R&D phase and

do not represent business opportunities for the moment.

A process could be thought of, in which microalgae farms are used to capture carbon from

flue gas and in which the resulting biomass is transformed into biofuels. Resulting biofuel

would then be burnt and released flue gas would be captured and permanently stored with

classic CCS. Figure 3.2.3.c schematizes this process. But such a process would require further

investigation, as no relevant publications have been found in the literature for such a process.

32


The conclusion of this part is that microalgae farms implemented near fossil-fuel fired power

plants or other industries can be used to capture carbon dioxide from flue gases. Because CO2

emissions in the atmosphere are reduced, carbon credits are being generated from the

production of microalgae with flue gases, and in addition, microalgae farms benefit from a

free source of CO2. Therefore, by using flue gas from industry to provide CO2 to microalgae

farms, production costs of microalgal biomass can be reduced by up to 15% (Doucha et al.,

2005). However, carbon capture from flue gas with microalgae is hardly achievable for large-

scale industry, as surface area required for the implementation of microalgae farms near the

source of flue gases would be too big. And using microalgae for the sole purpose of capturing

CO2 from flue gases does not look like a viable option economically speaking. However, after

the production process, biomass can be used to make lots of different value-added by-

products that have the potential to make a microalgae-based carbon capture from flue gas

system a good business opportunity, as we are going to see in the next chapter.

Figure 3.2.3.c. Combination of carbon capture with microalgae farm and classic CCS of the biofuels produced by the

microalgae

33


Figure 4.1. The different products that can be made out of micro-algae, adapted from Reissman (2013)

4. Business opportunities in the field of microalgae

This chapter draws an overview of the business opportunities in the field of

microalgae, among which biofuel production, use of microalgae to recycle waste

water, and use of microalgal biomass to make valuable by-products.

4.1. Introduction

As explained in the previous chapters, microalgae can grow at a very fast rate and in very

adverse conditions. Microalgae have the potential of being used to mitigate carbon emissions

in flue gas from power plants and industry manufactories (like cement factories or steel

manufactories). Using flue gases to provide CO2 to microalgae, which are essential to their

growth, is the first business opportunity that has been evocated in this research. If several

authors support the idea of using microalgae to capture carbon dioxide from flue gas, this is

not only because microalgae can capture carbon dioxide from flue gases, but this is because

valuable by-products can be made out of microalgae too, thus making microalgae-based

businesses potentially profitable.

Several by-products can be made with microalgal biomass, like biofuel, animal food,

pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals4, human food, chemicals like colourings, or fertilizer

(Spolaore et al., 2006; Priyadarshani and Rath, 2012). Figure 4.1 below illustrates this idea.

34


The process of growing microalgae can be associated with the recycling of waste water too

(Mata et al., 2010). This chapter will investigate the opportunities of business in the field of

microalgae. First of all, let‘s have a look at the potential for microalgae-based biofuel.

4.2. Microalgae for biofuel production

4.2.1. Why microalgae-based biofuel?

Several forms of fuel made out of vegetable oil – or biofuel – have been being developed until

now:

First generation biofuels are made with food crop like rapeseed oil, sugarcane, wheat,

soybean, sunflower oil, palm oil and maize (Sahoo, 2010). Unluckily, it is considered

that first generation biofuels cannot satisfy even a small portion of the actual demand

for oil (Chisti, 2007) and that they compete with food production and can precipitate

water shortages and deforestation (Brennan and Owende, 2010).

Second generation biofuels are made with lignocellulosic biomass4, and do not impact

directly the food market, but they still compete for land with food production

(Brennan and Owende, 2010).

Microalgae-based third generation biofuels, however, do not have all the major

drawbacks of first and second generation biofuels, and are considered to be a

technically viable alternative energy resource (Brennan and Owende, 2010).

Indeed, because they are very rich in oil and because of the rising prices of petroleum,

biofuels from microalgae have been arousing interest since the middle of the 20th

century.

Meier is one of the pioneers in this field, and had already suggested the idea of using

microalgae to produce biofuels in 1955 (Meier, 1955, as cited in Packer, 2009).

When compared with terrestrial oil crops, microalgae have a yielding for biomass and oil

production between 30 and 100 times higher (Chisti, 2007; Demirbas and Demirbas, 2011).

Based on the yielding of microalgae, only 1-3% of the total cropping area of the USA would

be required to produce 50% of USA‘s demand for oil (Chisti, 2007). Goodall (2009)

calculated that to completely replace the 80 million barrels of oil a day that the world is

currently using to power engines with microalgae-biofuel, only 30 million hectares of farming

surface would need to be used, which is slightly more than the size of the United Kingdom.

35


And the lands used to produce these algae do not need to be arable lands that could otherwise

have been used to grow food crops, as algae can be grown on any land, as long as they have

salty water or even wastewater.

This high yielding is coupled with other advantages which make microalgae a very high

potential for biofuel production:

Though they need an aqueous environment to develop correctly, microalgae require

less water than other oil crop to grow and do not require fresh water (brackish water

can be used) (Amaro et al., 2012)

They do not need arable land to grow (Amaro et al., 2012)

Microalgae-farms can be used for several goals: biofuel production can be combined

with waste water treatment (which moreover offers the advantage of providing free

nutrients for microalgae) (Singh and Gu, 2010) and CO2 capture from industrial flue

gas (Doucha et al., 2005)

They do not need pesticides to grow (Amaro et al., 2012)

Algae biofuel is non-toxic, contains no sulfur, and is highly biodegradable

(Powerplantccs, 2014).

Moreover, using biofuels as an alternative to fossil fuel is sustainable: only one unit of energy

is required to produce eight units of microalgae-based biofuel energy (Chisti, 2008) and

burning biofuel instead of fossil fuel contributes to reducing net carbon emissions into the

atmosphere. Indeed biofuels are made thanks to photosynthesis, which is the process that

takes CO2 out of the atmosphere (or flue gas) to convert it into biomass, which is then

transformed and burnt, and consequently releases back carbon into the atmosphere, thus

maintaining a sustainable cycle (Chisti, 2008; Taylor et al., 2013). Microalgae-based biofuels

could even be considered as carbon negative: the process of transforming microalgae into

biofuel leaves waste biomass behind, which contains a high percentage of carbon and which

can be either used for production of valuable by-products or be buried for long-term carbon

storage (Taylor et al., 2013).

Because of all these qualities, microalgae present a high potential for biofuel production.

R&D for microalgae-based biofuel is today a strategic issue for governments and global

companies, which are investing billions of dollars in research for microalgae-based biofuels

(Oilgae, 2014). Among these companies, there are the NASA, Boeing, the US army, BP, the

36


Carbon Trust UK (multi-million pound R&D project), CSIRO (Australia), Neste Oil

($850,000 project, New Zealand).

So which biofuels can be synthetized with algal biomass today, and in which extent are

microalgae-based biofuels economically viable?

4.2.2. Technical and economic aspects of making biofuels with microalgae

Research for microalgae-based biofuels has been ongoing and so far, several forms of biofuel

have successfully been synthetized. Some of these biofuels have been computed in table 4.2.2

below, as well as their production processes.

Table 4.2.2. Different types of microalgae-based biofuels and their manufacturing process, adapted from

Chisti (2007), Brennan and Owende (2010), Mata et al. (2010), Amaro et al. (2012) and Powerplantccs

(2014)

Among all these biofuels, biodiesel presents a high potential (Chisti, 2008). The formula of

biodiesel is the same as petroleum diesel and the process of transeterification, which

transforms algal into biomass, has a very high yielding of theoretically 1 kg of biodiesel out of

1 kg of biomass, with glycerine as a valuable by-product, which can be used e.g. for the

manufacturing of soaps (Mata et al., 2006).

Economically speaking, production costs for microalgal biodiesel are estimated to range

between US$2.95/L and US$3.8/L, depending on whether raceways or photobioreactors are

used to grow microalgae (Demirbas, 2010). Chisti (2007) proposes a formula to relate the

price of crude oil (US$/barrel) to the sourcing price of microalgae oil (US$/L) in order for

microalgae oil to be competitive:

With the approximate price of a barrel of oil in August 2014 (Bloomberg, 2014) which is

about US$100, microalgae oil would have to cost US$0.69/L in order to be competitive with

37


petroleum, according to this formula. In 2007, costs at which microalgal oil start to compete

with petroleum were US$0.48/L for cultivation in open ponds, and US$0.72/L for cultivation

in photobioreactors (percentage of oil by weight for microalgae grown in photobioreactors

can reach 70%) (Chisti, 2007).

As prices for oil keep raising and R&D in microalgae production and biofuel keep decreasing,

we may reach a point in the future where microalgae-based biofuels will be economically

more interesting than fossil fuel. Figure 4.2.2 below illustrates this idea.

Production of biofuel with microalgae at small scale is already a well-established process. But

adaptation of microalgae-based biofuel production for large scale will require the intervention

of genetic engineering and optimization of the methods for harvesting microalgae and

extracting oil out of them, in order for microalgae-based biofuel costs to decrease and be

competitive with fossil fuel (Chisti and Yan, 2011).

4.3. Microalgae used to treat waste water

Microalgae can find a high density of nutrients in waste water (mainly Nitrogen and

Phosphorous), which are favourable for their growth (Park et al., 2011). For Benemann

(2008), the most economically viable business opportunity for microalgae-based technologies

to mitigate carbon emissions today lies in the development of solutions which combine

microalgae harvesting for biofuel production and waste water treatment with microalgae.

Figure 4.2.2. Diagram showing expected trends for the evolution of prices for petroleum and algal oil

production and enlightening the fact that if the trends go on, algal oil will become cheaper than petroleum

at some point (on creation)

38


Three kinds of waste water can be used for growing microalgae:

Urban waste water

Agricultural waste water

Industrial waste water

In conventional urban waste water treatment, air is injected to provide O2 to bacteria which

break down the organic waste. This process requires energy (Benemann and Pedroni, 2007).

However, microalgae feed with nutrients contained in waste water and 1kg of microalgae

produces 1kg of O2 with photosynthesis (Benemann and Pedroni, 2007; Park et al., 2011).

Using microalgae to provide O2 to bacteria in waste water treatment ponds would be very

advantageous: the energy-consuming process of injecting air in the pond would not be

necessary anymore, and microalgae could be used to make valuable by-products like biofuel

(Benemann and Pedroni, 2007). The main drawback of urban waste water is that their content

is not predictable, therefore requiring adaptable facilities for their treatment (Benemann and

Pedroni, 2007).

On the contrary, agricultural and industrial waste water content are more easily predictable

and the same process can be used to recycle it. Agricultural and industrial waste water are full

of ions like NH4+, NO3

-, and PO4

3-, which often contaminate water bodies and unbalance the

local biological equilibrium (with eutrophication5) (Mata et al., 2010; Singh and Gu, 2010).

These ions are nutrients for microalgae and this waste water could actually be used as a free

source of nutrients for microalgae (Singh and Gu, 2010).

Table 4.3 below draws an overview of the advantages versus the drawbacks of combining

waste water treatment with microalgae production.

Table 4.3. Advantages and drawbacks of combining waste water treatment with microalgae production,

adapted from Benemann and Pedroni (2007), Park et al. (2011), and Craggs et al. (2012),

Advantages Drawbacks

Fresh water consumption reduction – smaller

water footprint

Requires control of parameters like pH, CO2

concentration and nutrients concentration

Nutrients cost reduction Biomass grown with waste water cannot be used for

any application because of sanitary regulations.

Biomass is suitable for products like biofuel or

fertilizer

Win-win situation: makes the process of treating

waste water cheaper, and makes the process of

growing microalgae cheaper

Land use optimization Requires control of algal species used, presence of

grazers and/or pathogens

Easy retrofitting of existing waste water

treatment plants and reproducibility

Treatment requires daylight – productivity depends

on the season and on the time of the day

39


Craggs et al. (2012) discuss the construction and operation of a 5-ha waste water treatment

plant using microalgae. Figure 4.3.a shows a schematic diagram of the concept discussed and

figure 4.3.b shows a photograph of one of the four 1.25-ha algal ponds discussed. The study

concludes with the high viability (in terms feasibility and costs) of this technology and the

reproducibility of the results gained for all four ponds.

Figure 4.3.b. Photograph of one of the 1.25-ha algal ponds with an algal harvester (Craggs et al., 2012)

Clean water Waste water

Figure 4.3.a. Schematic diagram showing the concept of utilizing microalgae production for combined

waste water treatment and biogas fabrication to power the water treatment plant, adapted from Craggs et

al. (2012)

40


Recycling waste water with microalgae is a mature technology. Moreover, 10-30% of the

production costs for microalgae come from the nutrients, the CO2, and fresh water (Park et al.

2011). Using waste water for microalgae production would save nutrients and fresh water

costs; and combining it with flue gas injection (as a source of CO2) could break down

radically the production costs for microalgae (Benemann, 2008).

4.4. What can be done with algae biomass

4.4.1. Fertilizers

Another source of GHG mitigation using microalgae is their use as a fertilizer. It is estimated

that 3kg of CO2 are emitted for the production of 1kg of fertilizer with gas as energy

(Benemann and Pedroni, 2007). Whereas industrial fertilizers require Nitrogen and

Phosphorous as ingredients, microalgae can recycle these compounds out of waste water to

grow (Benemann and Pedroni, 2007). Microalgae-based fertilizer is a valuable by-product of

algal biomass and a cheap fertilizer (Mata et al., 2010). Microalgae-based biofertilizer can be

made with ―waste biomass‖, which is what is left after the transformation of microalgae into

another by-product like biofuel, and therefore making microalgae production a zero waste

outcomes system (Brennan and Owende, 2010).

4.4.2. Human food industry, pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals

Microalgae produce numerous substances which exhibit positive effects on health. (Pulz and

Gross, 2004). Among these substances, the most common are:

Antioxidants

Colors and food-coloring products like β-carotene (for vitamin A), astaxanthin

(coloring used for fish flesh), or lutein (coloring used to color chicken skin)

Polyunsaturated fatty acids (like Omega 3)

Polysaccharides

Toxins for drugs with effects like amnesic, cytotoxic (anticancer drug), antiviral,

antimicrobial, and antifungal

(Pulz and Gross, 2004; Priyadarshani and Rath, 2012).

41


Microalgae for human nutrition usually take the form of tablets, capsules of powder, or

liquids, which can be added in beverages, snack food, noodles, candy, or simply be taken as

pills (Spolaore et al., 2006).

Commonly used species of microalgae in nutraceutical/pharmaceutical production include

Chlorella sp., Dunaliella sp., Spirulina sp. (Priyadarshani and Rath, 2012). It is estimated that

about 10,000 tons of dry algal biomass is produced from these species per year already

(Benemann, 2008). Substances extracted from microalgae is highly dependent on the species,

as shows table 4.4.2.a below, which computes possible downstream applications associated

with a species.

Table 4.4.2.a. Non-exhaustive list of microalgal species with some of their potential downstream

applications, adapted from Borowitzka (1999), Spolaore et al. (2006), Chisti (2007), Wang et al. (2010),

and Ho et al., (2011)

Several authors have identified cultivation of microalgae to make food supplements, drugs or

chemicals as one of the most profitable pathway for microalgae biomass‘ by-products

42


(Olaizola, 2003; Pulz and Gross, 2004; Spolaore et al., 2006; Benemann, 2008). Table 4.4.2.b

shows examples of companies which have been using microalgae for their health products.

Table 4.4.2.b. Some company names with the substances they extract from microalgae for their food- or

drug-related industry, adapted from Pulz and Gross (2004)

4.4.3. Animal food industry

Microalgae biomass can be used for animal food production. Microalgae are used as valuable

protein supplement or substitute to more conventional proteins sources like soy bean or fish

meal. It is particularly used for poultry farming and aquaculture: it is estimated that about

30% of the world algal production goes to feed these animals (Spolaore et al., 2006; Becker,

2007). Small amounts of algal biomass have been demonstrated to positively affect the

physiology of animals, by boosting their immune system and improving their external aspect

(hair more shiny, feathers more beautiful) (Pulz and Gross, 2004).

The use of algae biomass as feedstock for animals can be combined with other GHG

mitigating applications. For example, fishes in aquaculture need Omega-3 fatty acids to grow,

which are provided to them through their food. These nutrients in aquaculture are usually

pressed out of low-value fish and krill caught in the ocean and combined in pellets with

additives (Pauly and Watson, 2009). But massive fishing of krill is not sustainable in the long

43


Figure 4.4.4. Algae-powered streetlamp of Pierre Calleja (Calleja, 2013)

term and therefore, alternative solutions need to be found to feed fish farms with Omega-3

fatty acids. One solution which is being developed in Norway consists in capturing CO2 to

supply an algae-farm with nutrients and use these algae to process an oil rich in Omega-3

required for the development of fishes. It is believed that between 300 and 400 kilogrammes

of oil can be processed out of 1 ton of algae. And this oil rich in Omega-3 fatty acids will not

only be used to feed fishes, as there is an important demand in health and pharmaceutical

industry as well (McGrath, 2014).

4.4.4 Other business opportunities and algae-based technologies being

developed

Microalgae have a very high potential for by-products, yet not exploited at its full potential.

Some entrepreneurs and companies are developing microalgae-based innovations which have

the potential to capture carbon from the atmosphere and/or to be an alternative to other

solutions which emit more carbon dioxide. Some of them are:

Bioplastics – Plastics can be made out of microalgae, thus mitigating carbon

emissions from the production of petroleum-based plastic. Cellulose-based plastics,

poly-lactic acid to produce polymers, PolyHydroxiAlcanoate polymers and bio-

polyethylene are some examples of plastics which can be derived from microalgae

(Benemann and Pedroni, 2007; Oilgae, 2014).

A streetlamp powered by microalgae – Fermentalg has developed an algae-powered

lamp that should be able to produce light thanks to the storage of the electrons

produced by photosynthesis in batteries and the restitution of this energy as light

through leds (Calleja, 2013), (figure 4.4.4).

44


Microalgae used as a construction material – Ploechinger (2011) patented a

construction material made out of microalgae, with very good insulating

characteristics.

Microalgae for cosmetics – Microalgae can be used to make anti-aging creams, hair

and sun care products, or moisturizers. Luxury brands are investigating this market

already and luxury brands like LVMH and Daniel Jouvence in France have even

invested in their own microalgae production systems (Spolaore et al., 2006).

4.5. Conclusion of the literature review

Microalgae have the potential to reduce the net emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere:

either directly, with e.g. direct injection of flue gases into the microalgae farms and

direct capture of CO2,

or indirectly, through e.g. recycling of waste water, or the production of goods (like

biofuel, bioplastics, food, biomass by-products) that would have otherwise emitted

more CO2 (Benemann and Pedroni, 2007).

However, exact quantification of net CO2 emissions reduction cannot be achieved. Collet et

al. (2013) investigated fifteen different Life-Cycle Assessments for microalgae-based

biofuels, and concluded that guidelines and rules need to be set for analyses to be comparable

together and for the numbers they display to mean anything.

No general figure can be provided to illustrate the way in which microalgae are reducing net

carbon emissions. It depends on parameters like:

The source of CO2 used to feed the microalgae (atmosphere, flue gas,

bicarbonates)

The species of algae (strains do not capture CO2 with the same efficiency)

The technology used to grow microalgae

The conditions of growth (environment, weather)

It has been shown that microalgae have a huge potential for fast carbon capture with

photosynthesis. In addition to have the potential to mitigate carbon emissions, microalgae can

be used for a lot of different applications. When several applications are combined together,

microalgae-businesses have the potential to be highly profitable (Benemann, 2008).

45


Moreover, as Pulz and Gross (2004, p.646) say, ―microalgal biotechnology—today still in its

infancy—can be seen as a gateway to a multibillion dollar industry‖. Interest for microalgae is

recent, and R&D keeps decreasing the production costs and making microalgae-by-products

more cost-effective.

Table 4.5 below summarises the advantages of microalgae for business applications to

mitigate carbon emissions.

Table 4.5. Summary of the advantages of microalgae for business applications to mitigate CO2 emissions

Advantages Description Reference

Microalgae grow fast

Microalgae can double their volume within a day, can be

harvested daily, and have the potential to compete with the most

productive biofuel crops in terms of productivity

- Chisti, 2007

- Goodall, 2009

- Demirbas and

Demirbas, 2011

Microalgae can have

high biofuel yields

Through the process of photosynthesis, microalgae convert

sunlight, CO2 and nutrients into oil and sugar, which can be

turned into biofuel. Production of biofuel can range between

2,000 and 5,000 gallons per acre per year

- Weber, 2009

Microalgae consume

CO2

1.8 kg of Co2 is required to produce 1 kg of microalgal biomass.

Activities linked to microalgae production have the potential to

have negative net CO2 emissions (which means that they use

more CO2 than they produce). Microalgae can be used to

capture carbon dioxide in flue gases and therefore diminish the

impact of fossil combustion on the atmosphere.

- Becker, 1994

- Doucha et al.,

2005

- Sayre, 2010

- Sudhakar et al.,

2011

Microalgae farming do

not compete with

agriculture…

Microalgae farms can use lands that are not suitable for proper

traditional agriculture, as well as water that are not useable for

other crops (see next line).

- Amaro et al.,

2012

…and can be used to

recycle waste water

Microalgae can be used to recycle urban, agricultural, or

industrial waste water as they are feeding on the Nitrogen and

Phosphorous compounds present in these water. This is a win-

win situation for the recycling of waste water and the

production of biomass which can afterxards be turned into

useful products like biofuel

- Park et al., 2011

- Craggs et al.,

2012

Microalgal biomass can

be used to make valuable

by-products

Algae biomass can be used to make many by-products, such as

biofuel, human food, animal feed, drugs, plastics, fertilizers, or

cosmetics.

- Benemann and

Pedroni, 2007

Microalgae industry

creates employment

As industry develops, a wide variety of jobs related to

microalgae businesses is defined. It is estimated by the Algae

Biomass Organization that creation of 220,000 jobs in this

sector by 2020 is achievable.

- Obama, 2012

- Algae Biomass

Organization,

2014b

46


5. Methodology of the dissertation

This chapter explains the methodology of the research to gather data, analyse the

findings and compare them together.

5.1. Introduction

In order to answer the questions raised by this dissertation, this chapter discusses the

methodology used to collect and analyse data.

Two types of data were used: secondary data and primary data.

1. Secondary data are described by Webb (2002) as data that have already been gathered

for similar or related studies to the research undertaken. They can be found in

published or electronic sources (Wilson, 2012). Therefore, secondary data are ―faster

and less expensive to acquire than primary data‖ (Wilson, 2012, p.51). Gathering

secondary data is the first step of data collection in a research (Creswell, 2009).

However, their relevancy for the research undertaken may not be optimal, as they were

not gathered for the purpose of answering this research specifically, and as they may

be out of date. Secondary data is collected in chapters two to four, to provide the

researcher with a basic understanding of the current state-of-the-art of microalgae-

based technologies and their potential to mitigate carbon emissions.

2. To supplement secondary data, primary data was collected through interviews of

experts in their field, who provided updated content to the research and also

perspectives on the wider technical, socio-economic and political constraints of

working in this field and scaling up to a business case (which are not necessarily

published).

The next sub-chapters explain how the primary data collection process was designed and how

data was analysed.

47


5.2. Conducting qualitative research

5.2.1. Conducting qualitative research

Qualitative research is being used when data collected is not quantifiable (Saunders et al.,

2007; Wilson, 2012). Examples of tools utilised to collect data for qualitative research

comprehend individual interviews, focus groups, observations, ethnographies and

netnographies (Punch, 2005). To answer the research question, an exploratory research was

undertaken, which is ―a valuable means to ask open questions to discover what is happening

and gain insights about a topic of interest‖ (Saunders et al., 2007, p.137). Experts in the field

of microalgae, both from research and from business backgrounds, were interviewed to get

opinions and insights of the potential of microalgae to make economically viable businesses

while mitigating carbon dioxide.

Interviews can be split between two broad categories: structured interviews, and less-

structured in-depth interviews (Langley, 1987).

Structured interviews have pre-set questions and sub-questions depending on answers.

Though they facilitate comparison of data, they do not allow flexibility. And sticking

too close to a model may keep the interviewee from elaborating on relevant subjects.

In less-structured interviews, interviewers can ask questions that were not initially

computed in the set of questions. They can therefore go deeper in the data collection,

focusing on the background of the interviewee. Less-structured in-depth interviews

can be either semi-structured (a mix between pre-established questions and open

questions) or unstructured (takes the form of a conversation between the interviewer

and the interviewee) (Burns, 2000). Table 5.2.1 sums up the advantages and

drawbacks of each kind of interview.

48


Table 5.2.1. Comparison between the main types of interviews, adapted from Langley (1987) and Burns

(2000)

Saunders et al. (2007) recommend doing semi-structured in-depth interviews for exploratory

research, because it is a flexible type of interviewing which allows interactive discussion

while still having a frame. In opposite to structured interviews, which gain ―a ‗superficial

excavation‘ of the respondent‘s knowledge about a specific subject, [semi-structured

interview] tries to go more deeply into the subject as the interview proceeds‖ (Belk et al,

2013, p.31).

5.2.2. Semi-structured interviews

For the purpose of this research, semi-structured interviews were conducted by the researcher

to collect data. Interviews can take several forms like face-to-face, phone interview or email

interview (Punch, 2005; Creswell, 2009). For this research, phone interviews were carried out,

using the software Skype, which allows making cheap international phone calls with video.

Using Skype as a tool for the interview is an efficient way to reaching interviewees who

cannot allocate time for a face-to-face meeting or who are far away (Janghorban et al., 2014).

All Skype interviews were recorded using a plug-in, after making sure that the respondent

agreed with that (Wilson, 2012). It was asked to respondents in the consent form (Appendix

II), and at the beginning of the discussion, whether they agreed to being recorded. And it was

49


written in the information sheet too (Appendix I) that conversations would be recorded.

Respondents were aware that data would be safely stored (audio files stored on the computer

of the researcher and password protected, and deleted at the end of the research).

For respondents who agreed to take part in the study, but who could not manage to find a time

slot for the interview, a questionnaire was sent to them by email, containing the same

questions that were asked during the interview (Appendix VI), but to which some guidance

was added. As said by Meho (2006, p.1293) ―Semi-structured email interviewing can be a

viable alternative to the face-to-face interviews, especially when time, financial constraints, or

geographical boundaries are barriers to an investigation‖. Semi-structured interviews by email

were achieved through an exchange of emails, asking clarifications from the respondent when

required (Meho, 2006).

Prior to an interview to start, either it was a Skype interview or an email interview, an

information sheet and a consent form were sent to the respondent. It was required from the

respondent to read the Information sheet and return the consent form signed by email before

the interview begins. These documents can be seen in appendices I and II for the Skype

interview and in appendices IV and V for the email interview.

5.3. Questions

Two lists of questions were designed for the Skype interviews (Appendix III) and the Email

interview (Appendix VI). In one case, probing questions were added to guide the interviewer

during the Skype interview, and in the other case, guidance was provided to the respondent to

help him answer the questions.

As suggested by Creswell (2009), after a personal presentation of the researcher and the

context of the research, the first two questions asked to the interviewees were on their

background and the microalgae-project they were working on. These questions were used as

―ice-breakers‖ (Creswell, 2009, p.183), as well as tips to guide the researcher in his probing

questions.

As recommended by Creswell (2009) no more than five topics were discussed using open-

ended questions, and probing questions to go deeper in the discussion. Topics investigated

were asking details to the respondents about:

50


The technology of growing and harvesting microalgae

The economy and profitability of microalgae-based businesses (questions here were

asked only when relevant e.g. questions on profitability were not asked to researchers)

The opinion of respondents on the use of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions and

on the opportunities and challenges in the development of this technology

The opinion of respondents on the viability of microalgae-based biofuels and its future

The opinion of respondents on the most profitable microalgae-based business

opportunities at that time

These questions therefore covered the five research objectives defined in the introduction (see

1.2).

At the end of the discussion, interviewees were asked if they had further questions or

comments to make, and if they could name a potential respondent that they thought would

have expertise in the field of study and who would be prone to be interviewed

(―snowballing‖) (Creswell, 2009), before being said a final thank you.

5.4. Identification of the potential interviewee

Respondents were identified using a non-probability sampling: they were selected based on

several criteria (Saunders et al., 2007):

Activity linked to the field of microalgae

Experience as a researcher or as an entrepreneur/a consultant in the field of microalgae

Participants were experts in the field of microalgae coming from different backgrounds.

About half of them were researchers and the other half were representatives from microalgae

companies, scouted using several means:

- Searches on the Internet informed by companies, research groups and research papers

- Social media users (on Linked In or Twitter) who are members of discussion groups

on the technology and users whose personal details contain keywords like ―microalgae

carbon reduction‖

- And persons suggested by interviewees (snowballing)

Samples of cover letter and advertisement for discussion groups in social media are available

in appendices VII and VIII, respectively.

Eight respondents were interviewed using Skype and were located in several countries among

which the USA, India, Spain and France. And one respondent from South Africa filled a

questionnaire. Below is the list of respondents with some of their characteristics (Table 5.4).

51


Table 5.4. List of respondents with details regarding their activity and expertise

5.5. Analysis

During a Skype interview, the researcher was taking notes in order to have some back-up in

case of technical issue with the recording and for an easier analysis of the data afterwards, as

recommended by Creswell (2009). Directly after an interview was done, the researcher took

time to summarize key points discussed earlier with the interviewee, as suggested by Wilson

(2012).

Name

(duration

of

interview)

Country Context Function Experi-

ence Details

Rhona

(37min) USA Business

Algae

cultivation

consultant

+15

years

Expert in the field of microalgae strain selection

(knowing more than 3,000 strains of microalgae),

consultant for companies regarding the optimal

choice of strains for their activities and

optimisation of microalgae productivity

Robert

(1h07min) USA Business Entrepreneur

+35

years

Entrepreneur and sole proprietor of his business

of growing microalgae for oil and nutraceuticals –

Designer of a raceway and a photobioreactor

(patent-protected), inventor of one solution to

harvest microalgae and two solutions to extract

oil out of dried algae. Author of an e-book: The

great Algae adventure (2013)

Brennan

(25 min) India Business Director

+25

years

Director of a company which makes nutritional

products out of microalgae.

Consultancy for algae companies, specialized in

nutrition out of algae and the growth of diatoms.

Prakash

(32min) India

Research

for industry

Product

developer +5 years

Developing processes for natural ingredients from

microbial sources specially microalgae

Kyle

(22min) USA

Research

for industry

Mechanical

engineer +5 years

The interviewee is working at designing processes

to extract oil from microalgae.

Raphaël

(42min) France

Research

for

Business

Researcher

and manager

of the

research

team

+20

years

Doctor in chemistry specialized in use of agro-

resources to make by-products. Currently working

for a major company for algae as the manager of

the entire service of algal biomass.

Barrack

(39min) USA

Research

for industry

Graduate

research

assistant

+5 years Currently working at optimizing the air-to-liquid

CO2 mass transfer rate for microalgae cultivation.

Ryan

(question-

aire)

South

Africa Business

Consultant,

chemist and

entrepreneur

+30

years

The interviewee has a background in chemistry

and is working as a consultant in renewable

energy and as an entrepreneur who grows

microalgae to make biogas in South Africa

Paulo

(29min)

Spain

and USA

Research

for

academia

and

business

Researcher

and serial

entrepreneur

+20

years

The interviewee teaches in two universities (one

in Spain and on in the USA). He successfully

created three start-ups and does mentorship for

other start-ups, whose activity is linked to

renewable energy and/or carbon capture. One of

the projects on which the interviewee worked on

was carbon capture with microalgae from flue gas

to produce biofuel.

52


Interviews were transcribed in a word file and coded: the process of coding involves

segmenting the transcript into categories, which are then labeled by a code referring to the

objectives (Creswell, 2009). Ideas expressed by the interviewees were computed in an excel

file (with copy-and-paste tool), using one sheet for each objective and one sheet for other

ideas developed by the interviewees (N=6 sheets), as suggested by Saunders et al. (2007).

This process is called ―topic coding‖ (Punch, 2005). Meanwhile, memos were written in the

excel file to facilitate data analysis after the process of labeling, as advised by Punch (2005).

A table has been made for each interviewee in Appendix IX, with quotations from the

interview and memos to summarize data collected in each interview.

53


6. Findings and analysis of the results

This chapter presents the findings and an analysis of the interviews of the nine

respondents. Data collected are put in context of the objectives introduced in the first

chapter, and objectives are developed one-by-one. Analysis is made by comparing

data gathered by the interviews (primary data) and data collected during the literature

review (secondary data). Recommendations are being made directly at the end of each

objective.

6.1. Objective 1 – To investigate the technical and financial aspects of

growing microalgae

6.1.1. Growing microalgae - Open ponds versus photobioreactors

Respondents were using both open and closed systems to grow microalgae. Some of them had

preferences for photobioreactors, other preferred open systems, but for all of them, the option

adopted to grow microalgae depends on the final goals and on the business model.

The following quote illustrates this idea:

“I like photobioreactors. I use photobioreactors. I like open ponds systems. I use open ponds

systems. All systems have their pluses and minuses there is no perfect system. To tell people

what they should use depends on what resources they have.”(Rhona)

Raphaël says that photobioreactors are often used when the final product requires pure clean

algae. Open ponds are cheaper to operate, but are more adapted to strains that can resist to

contamination and grow in adverse conditions. Barrack has the same opinion:

“[Your choice] really depends on your end product. If you are trying to make fuel you are

definitely going to look at open ponds and raceways. But if you are trying to make high-value

products, it is also very clear that closed systems, like tubular photobioreactors, are much

better.”

Photobioreactors are especially adapted for the production of high profit-margin products like

food supplements. Conditions of growth for microalgae can be optimized in PBRs, as all

parameters (temperature, pH, gas exchange, flow rate, algae species) can be controlled (Ugwu

et al., 2008). On the other hand, if parameters are not well set, it can result in bad productivity

54


or in the worst scenario to death of all microalgae in the photobioreactor. This idea is

illustrated by the following quote:

“[With photobioreactors], the advantage is that you CAN control everything. The

disadvantage is that you HAVE to control everything.” (Robert)

Prakash has been growing microalgae in both systems, and while density of production can be

up to 10 times higher with photobioreactors than with open ponds, photobioreactors are not

necessarily more viable economically speaking. As Rhona says, “The magic numbers are to

find how much to grow to make money out of it”.

While capital costs are far much less for open ponds, the main disadvantage of this technic is

that the productivity of the batch is dependent on the weather conditions and contamination

(Demirbas and Demirbas, 2010). As Prakash says, with open ponds, ―you are […] dependent

upon the environmental conditions‖. To solve this problem, he proposes one solution which

consists in placing the pond under a greenhouse, which enables control of temperature and air

humidity while not being a totally closed system. But as pointed out by Li et al. (2006), the

economic viability of covered ponds depends on the adversity of the environment in which

microalgae are evolving, as it implies additional capital costs. Another option to solve the

problem of contamination is polyculture, which consists in growing several strains of algae in

the same batch. Microalgae work in synergy to keep other algae species from settling in the

pond (Robert).

The investigation on growing techniques has shown that each option has its advantages and

drawbacks, and the choice of an option in particular depends on the resources available

(water, nutrients), the weather conditions (sunlight, rainfalls, temperature, humidity) and the

target for the production (high-value products like nutraceuticals, which are subject to

regulations, or biomass for e.g. fertilizer or biofuel production).

The same conclusion was reached for harvesting techniques: use of chemicals and use of

accurate separation techniques is determined by the targeted end-products and the profitability

induced by the chosen option at the end.

55


6.1.2. Production costs and profitability

Productivity

Different levels of productivity can be reached depending on the technology adopted to grow

microalgae and depending on the environment.

Brennan is achieving a productivity of 1g/L/day in open ponds

Prakash displays a yield of 4g of dry biomass per Litre in open ponds, and 40g/L in

photobioreactors

Ryan reaches a yield of 150 g/m2/Day with wild microalgae in open ponds

Robert informs an average yielding of 15g/m2/Day, which corresponds to

approximately 115g/L of dry biomass, achievable in 7 days. Yield can go up to

125g/m2/Day

Productivity depends highly on the conditions in which microalgae are grown, as show these

figures. Not only are the systems in which microalgae are grown and the environment key, but

the way microalgae process nutrients is very important too. Robert reaches the highest

yielding with mixotrophic growth. Mixotrophic growth combines both advantages from

autotrophic growth and heterotrophic growth, i.e. microalgae capture carbon with the process

of photosynthesis, AND in sugars added to the batch.

Costs and profits

Production costs and profitability are highly dependent on the final products and whether or

not several business opportunities (see 4.5) are used simultaneously (like combination of

waste water treatment, carbon capture from flue gases, and use of biomass to produce

fertilizer and biofuel for example) (Benemann, 2008). Different production costs were

informed by the respondents:

Robert produces microalgae in photobioreactors for approximately US$4.5/kg (US$2

a pound), which is close to the estimation of Benemnn (2008) of production costs of

US$5/kg of dry biomass for a species like Spirulina.

Robert is growing microalgae for nutraceuticals production, which can be sold at

US$45/kg (US$20 a pound). Therefore, the net profit for his product is nine-fold the

production costs.

56


Ryan sells microalgae-ethanol to oil companies for €0.5€/L, which makes a profit

margin of 20%. This refers to a productivity of €0.025/m2/Day.

Raphaël informed production costs ranging between €1/kg and €4/kg dry biomass, but

he expects them to drop below €1/kg in the Future. This agrees with the numbers

provided by Norsker et al. (2011) and Barbosa et al. (2013) for whom €4/kg

production costs are achievable today and €0.5/kg will be achievable in the future.

Other respondents did not provide figures for confidentiality issues or because they are not

selling their products.

Figures provided by the respondents tend to show that microalgae-businesses can be

profitable today, and they are going to become more and more profitable as technology

evolves (Norsker et al., 2011). Barbosa et al. (2013) made a model in which a combination of

microalgae used to recycle waste water, and make Oxygen, biofuel and feed as by-products

would start to be profitable at production costs of €1.65/kg (in the Netherlands context). This

is already achievable as production costs are below 1€/kg in places like Turkey (Raphaël, in

an email exchange).

6.1.3. Recommendations

It is recommended for entrepreneurs and other people willing to develop an activity related

with microalgae production that they take special care in the choice of the location for their

farms. Natural resources and environment conditions are key for the choice of a technology

and productivity will be highly dependent on the initial choice of the technology and the

location.

6.2. Objective 2 – To investigate the potential of microalgae to mitigate

carbon emissions from flue gas

6.2.1. Findings and analysis

Projects to sequestrate carbon dioxide from flue gases are already on the go. Different

microalgae farms in the world are capturing CO2 from flue gases at different scale, such as the

distillery of Glenturret in Scotland, the heating system of the MIT (USA), or the 3,800MW

power plant at Niederausseim (Germany).

57


Respondents are split on microalgae for carbon capture from flue gas: 6 interviewees are

persuaded microalgae have potential for large scale capture of CO2 from flue gas in the future

while others are doubtful regarding the potential for high scale implementation. For Rhona

and Raphaël, carbon capture from flue gas using microalgae will only be viable if several

business opportunities can be combined at the same time, as illustrated by the following

quote:

“I think it will be economically viable in the future to use microalgae for carbon capture from

flue gases. The brakes today are still the operating costs. Growing microalgae ONLY to

capture carbon dioxide will never be profitable. But you can make use of biomass for by-

products production.”(Raphaël)

This agrees with Doucha et al. (2005) and Benemann (2008).

Most of the respondents however admit that there is still a lot of R&D to do, in order for the

technology to be efficient. There is especially potential for optimization of microalgae

genome to make genetically-modified microalgae that are more resistant to adverse conditions

(like high temperatures and presence of toxic compounds), as Prakash remarks. And research

can go very fast, since ―with microalgae, R&D is three times faster than with any other

plant‖, he says.

Nevertheless microalgae look to have potential to capture CO2 from flue gas. A respondent

spoke about a solution that was not discussed in the literature review, which consists in

injecting flue gases into the ocean, to produce microalgae directly in the ocean, which will

imply production of O2 and feed for fishes. As a consequence, the respondent foresees a soar

in the population of fishes, which is actually plummeting, and therefore considers fishes as a

by-product of his solution. This solution may present some potential to reduce CO2 in the flue

gases, as many power plants are located near the sea or near a water body, to cool the system

(UCSUSA, 2013). But before this to happen, careful environmental impacts with pilot studies

should be made.

Benemann (2008) and Sayre (2010) emit doubts regarding the potential of microalgae to

capture carbon dioxide from large power plants. Capturing all carbon dioxide emitted by

massive power plants would require too much land to be doable.


58


“You will never ever sequestrate CO2 from a super-massive power plant of 360 MW with

algae. You just can‟t. It requires way too much land. Thousands of hectares of land. […]

Personally I do not see CO2 sequestration ever happening for a large system like that.”

(Barrack)

RWE (2009) informs that microalgae farms could capture between 120t and 200t of CO2 per

hectare per year at their power plant in Niederausseim, based on a 1,000m2 microalgae farm

experiment. However, Niederausseim power plant emits about 20 million tons of CO2 per

annum. Therefore, between 100,000 and 170,000 ha would be required to fully capture carbon

emissions from this coal-fired power plant. This is hardly achievable.

But carbon capture for small scale power plants may be more easily achievable, as Barrack

remarks:

“However I think it does have potential for small distributed systems. 2 or 3 MW or less. And

microalgae biomass will have to provide some valuable products to pay for this system.”

Most of the respondents agree at least on one point: carbon capture from flue gas with

microalgae can become viable (especially in terms of land area required) and profitable when

it is combined with other sources of profits. Therefore, biomass has to be usable to make by-

products, and for that purpose, precautions must be ensured: toxic compounds and heavy

metals have to be filtered upstream the injection of flue gas in the farm, as reminds Ryan.

But what could really drive the development of microalgae-based technologies to mitigate

carbon emissions is the carbon tax, as Kyle says: “the main driver [for microalgae based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions] will be the carbon taxes”. Indeed, in Australia, a

A$140 million-project for construction of a large-scale microalgae farm with carbon

sequestration from a power plant flue gas and production of biofuel is waiting for a policy on

carbon taxes to be voted to start. If carbon tax is voted at A$24.15/t of CO2, the project would

help reduce carbon tax bill of this power plant that emits more than 270 million tons of CO2

annually by several billions of Dollars (Algae.Tec, as reported in a document shared by a

respondent and dating from February 2014).

59



It has been found that carbon capture from flue gas with microalgae for low-scale industry

presents a potential, but would require the production of other by-products and the existence

of carbon taxes or other governmental funding to be economically viable. This technology

does not seem adapted to carbon capture from large industry‘s flue gases however, as it

requires an important surface of land available for its implementation.

It is recommended that the option of bubbling directly flue gases in the ocean to sequestrate

carbon in microalgae be investigated. Environmental impacts and changes in the biological

equilibrium may be mitigated by the implementation for example of a walled area where

ocean inflows and outflows would be controlled, which would limit the contact of the ocean

with the bubbling zone and therefore the risks of contamination by microalgae to the adjacent

area.

It is recommended that entrepreneurs use flue gas to grow microalgae, as it provides them

with a free source of nutrients, but they should keep in mind that using microalgae for the sole

purpose of capturing flue gas is not a profitable business opportunity today, and other sources

of incomes must be found.

It is recommended that R&D be continued, especially in genetics research for stronger

strains, to develop this technology and make carbon capture from flue gas an economically

and technologically viable option to mitigate carbon emissions.

6.3. Objective 3 – To identify the main opportunities and challenges for the

development of microalgae-based technologies


Interviewees have been asked questions about their opinion on the opportunities and

challenges for development of microalgae-based technologies to mitigate carbon emissions.

Three main topics for opportunities/challenges have been identified.

Funding and carbon taxes

One driver for the development of technologies and businesses in microalgae-to-mitigate-

CO2-emissions‘s activity is the existence of government funding and/or carbon taxes. Carbon

60


capture from flue gas with microalgae can only reduce the production costs by up to 15%

(Doucha et al., 2005). More incomes are required to make a business profitable, such as

governmental subsidies or carbon taxes. As Kyle says, ―the main driver will be the carbon

taxes‖. With carbon taxes, microalgae farms can virtually sell to CO2-emitting companies

each ton of CO2 that they capture through the process of growing microalgae; thus they can

potentially start making profits. Moreover, still lots of R&D are required in this field, which

require lots of funds. Carbon taxes and governmental funding could be a solution to access to

fund this R&D.

Hiring the good people

To make a business model work, finding the good people is key. For Rhona, Funding can

easily be obtained if the business model is viable. But good people are hard to find, and

failing to hiring the good people could lead to business failure.


“The biggest challenge is the people. Some people fail because they simply don‟t hire the

good people for their business model to work. Most experts in this field are in their over 70s

and it is hard to make them speak with young entrepreneurs.” (Rhona)

For Rhona, the best profiles in this field are people with both a background in Mechanical

Engineering and in Microbiology, i.e. ―People that actually know how to build a system for

the organisms they are trying to grow.‖

Acceptance by consumers

A driver for the growth of the market for microalgae by-products is the arousing of people

awareness. As Brennan remarks, today microalgae are not part of the diet of most of the

people, though they present lots of benefits for health. But once customers start to integrate

microalgae to their life, they create demand, and they generate incomes for microalgae

companies, which can then invest in R&D.

Research

Lots of research still needs to be done. Some of the main areas of improvement are

development of photobioreactors for large scale production and prevention of contamination

61


in open ponds (Robert), and research in genetics to make stronger microalgae strains

(Barrack, Raphaël).


It has been found that in order for microalgae to create viable business opportunities for

carbon emissions mitigation, research must still be done to improve technologies. In addition,

awareness of people should be raised on the topic and governments should invest in the field,

either with subsidies or by adopting stronger carbon taxes.

It is recommended that governments invest in R&D for microalgae technologies to mitigate

carbon emissions and adopt carbon taxes (or reinforce them), and that hey promote their

actions so that people become more aware of the potential of microalgae to reduce carbon

emissions. Meanwhile, R&D would be stimulated by this advertisement (as people start to

speak about it, ideas and professional vocations can appear) and by more money to finance

the research.

6.4. Objective 4 – To investigate the potential of microalgae-based biofuel to

mitigate carbon emissions, and as an alternative to fossil fuel in the Future


Companies and governments have been investing billions of Dollars in R&D for microalgae-

based biofuel. But it is still not competitive with petroleum and other biofuel. However, as

explained in part 4.2, microalgae present a potential for biofuel production (Chisti, 2007;

Amaro et al., 2012). The problem is to discover a cheap and fast process to turn microalgae

into biofuel. The following quote illustrates this idea:

“Oil we use in our cars now comes from algae back in the dinosaurs‟ days”. We just have to

reproduce the process of making oil at a faster pace.” (Rhona)

Microalgae-biofuel is still more expensive than petroleum today, so it cannot compete for

now (Chisti and Yan, 2011). However, microalgae-biofuel is already used for some small and

medium scale applications like in the US army, whose ―Great Green Fleet‖ program consists

in powering the US fleet navy partly with microalgae-based biofuel. Kyle believes that like

for lots of innovations, ―the military develops it and use it first and then civilians start to use

62


it.‖ And eventually, as R&D continues to develop and petroleum becomes more expensive,

microalgae-based biofuel will become competitive.

The following quotes illustrate this idea:

“If we continue to use petroleum products, then petroleum products are going to increase in

price. And this is going to be what will drive the algae-based solutions.” (Rhona)

It is a matter of just when fuel costs are increased enough to meet the decreasing costs of

algae-oil. (Barrack)

Ryan points out that microalgal biogas is already competitive. He himself sells microalgal

biogas for 75% the price of natural gas. However other interviewees insist that biofuels are

not cost-effective yet, like Paulo who says that to be cost-effective, biofuel production MUST

be mixed with other applications (like food, feed for agriculture and other products). As

Prakash remarks, entrepreneurs today that start to grow microalgae for biofuel production

often turn their coat inside-out and eventually produce other products with higher profit

margins.

The following quote exemplifies this idea:

“Entrepreneurs who invest in biofuel production today ultimately come to nutraceuticals

production, because biofuel production is not profitable yet.” (Prakash)

Globally, progresses are being made in the development of microalgae-biofuel, but the

―technology is not cost-effective yet‖ (Paulo). Nevertheless, interviewees all think that

microalgae-based biofuel is going to play a role in the future, even if it does not happen

tomorrow.

The following quote illustrates this opinion:

“I don‟t think it is gonna happen now, but maybe in 20, 30 years.” (Barrack)

Finally, most of the interviewees point out that using microalgae-based biofuel as an

alternative to petroleum would be sustainable. CO2 is captured by microalgae during the

process of photosynthesis. Then resulting biomass is transformed into biofuel which is

combusted and releases CO2 back into the atmosphere. Figure 6.4.1 below illustrates this idea.

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Lots of projects are being led in parallel for microalgae-based biofuel R&D. Solutions

discovered are not always promising, but eventually, all interviewees believe that microalgae-

based biofuel has the potential to compete with petroleum, provided that R&D continues to

decrease the production costs and that prices of petroleum keep increasing (As illustrated by

figure 4.2.2). But eventually, the use of microalgae-based biofuel as an alternative to fossil

fuel could have the potential to mitigate carbon emissions to the atmosphere.

It is therefore recommended that research keeps going for microalgae-based biofuels. Even

if entrepreneurs who initially start with biofuel production decide to turn their coat inside-out

because this technology is not cost-effective yet, they should keep developing the technology

in parallel (like Robert do) so that some progresses are continuously made in this field.

Moreover, if research is successful and leads to patent, the implementation of the solution

developed to large-scale production of biofuel could be an important revenue stream for a

company.

Figure 6.4.1. Sustainable cycle of microalgae-based biofuel production and combustion (on creation)

64


6.5. Objective 5 – To explore activity in the field of microalgae today and to

identify profitable business opportunities in the field of microalgae to

mitigate carbon emissions

6.5.1. Growing microalgae reduces net CO2 emissions

Apart from carbon capture from flue gases and production of biofuel, lots of opportunities

exist for the development of an activity in the field of microalgae. And because microalgae

capture CO2 to grow, production of algal biomass has the potential to reduce net carbon

emissions.

The following quote and diagram (figure 6.5.1) illustrate this idea:

―Flue gases will not necessary have to play a role. Depending on the environment and your

technology you can capture between 100 and 500 tons of CO2 from the atmosphere per

hectare per year with microalgae.‖ (Paulo)

Figure 6.5.1. Diagram illustrating reduction in net CO2 emissions in the atmosphere by producing by-

products out of algal biomass (on creation)

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6.5.2. Food production

Microalgae for food production has been identified as the most viable business opportunity by

interviewees. But production of human food is subject to regulations and not all species and

production processes are proper for human consumption. In the USA for example, there are

only seven strains that can be used for food production, according to Rhona. Spirulina and

Chlorella are the most grown species (Benemann, 2008; Rhona).

Microalgae can be used to produce valuable compounds for the agro-industry. As Raphaël

explains: ―Among high profit margin products that you can make with microalgae, there are

carotenoid, Omega-3, nutraceuticals. There is still some place in this market for new

companies, but it is not infinitely expansible‖.

Regulations for food industry imply more capital costs than for other applications. As Robert

remarks, ―for food production, you have to use photobioreactors. You have to guarantee that

there is no contamination‖. But the high capital costs implied by the implementation of

photobioreactors are justified by the potential high-value products one can make with algal

biomass: nutraceuticals. Robert assessed that he was able to have profit margins of 900% with

nutraceuticals. Moreover, the market is wide, as Robert points out:

“I have made a Super-food factory business plan and there are more than 500 pages of names

of companies, health food stores, that will be the market for capsules or tablets of algae.”

(Robert)

6.5.3. Other business opportunities

Other business opportunities to make use of microalgal biomass while reducing CO2

emissions exist:

Waste water recycling

Microalgae can be efficiently used to treat waste water: they feed on the nutrients and work in

synergy with waste-breaking bacteria (which feed on O2 produced by microalgae through

photosynthesis) (Benemann and Pedroni, 2007; Park et al., 2011). Interviewees supported the

idea of using waste water treatment as part of a source of incomes for microalgae-based

businesses. Moreover, using microalgae to process waste water would be beneficial for the

environment as no other energy-costly technology will be required to provide O2 to the

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bacteria, and agricultural run-off which otherwise would have been poured in water bodies,

leading to eutrophication, would instead be recycled by microalgae (Robert).

R&D for profits

Microalgae technologies are at a turning point now. Lots of technics are still in the R&D

phase and whether microalgae-based technologies will have potential for large-scale

utilisation in the future depends on the success of researchers to develop viable technologies,

economically speaking. Also, if researchers make important innovations applicable for large-

scale utilisation, they can patent it and make money out of it.


―One other opportunity is the development of technologies, R&D. If microalgae businesses

are going to develop, patents will sell for a high price.” (Paulo)

“If I had to start my company, I think I would develop some kind of photobioreactors that

companies who care about their carbon emissions would just have to add to their

infrastructure.” (Kyle)

Bio-plastics

As Benemann and Pedroni (2007) pointed out, microalgae can be used to produce bio-plastics

as an alternative to fossil-fuel-plastics. Nevertheless, processes to make microalgae-bio-

plastics still need some development to be truly profitable, and targets for the quality of bio-

plastics are very high, if they are to compete with fossil-fuel-plastics someday.


“Plastics made with microalgae are probably gonna be a big thing in the future. There are

two or three compounds that you can extract from the algae to make plastics.” “The problem

with plastics is that they will require lots of Research and Development. And the standards

are very high.” (Robert)

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Animal feed and fertilizers

When microalgal biomass has already be processed to extract interesting compounds for

biofuel or bio-plastics production for examples, what is left can be used to produce animal

feed and/or fertilizer, as suggested by Ryan and Robert.


“You can combine [a high-value] market with producing animal food or fertilizers, with what

is left of biomass in the process of extracting the compounds you are looking for.”(Raphaël)

Pulz and Gross (2004) and Brennan and Owende (2010) agree with this idea.

6.5.4. Combination of business opportunities

To make profits with microalgae businesses, respondents recommend combining business

opportunities. For example, microalgae could be used at the same time to recycle water and to

capture carbon from flue gas. Meanwhile, biomass would be used to produce biofuel, bio-

plastics, and fertilizer.


“What is interesting with microalgae is that you can combine several forms of business

together. For example you combine biofuel business with nutraceutical business. Then there

is a possibility of making money.” (Prakash)

“[To be profitable], you need to have a mix of productions to dedicate the growth of

microalgae for different applications such as nutraceuticals, food or feed for agriculture or

other products. Not only to produce biofuel.” (Paulo)


It has been found that microalgae have the potential of reducing carbon emissions by both

capturing CO2 and by producing alternatives to CO2-emitting products at the same time.

Microalgae can be used for multiple applications, but in order to have a profitable business, a

combination of available business opportunities should be made. Only nutraceuticals and

high-value chemical compounds production are viable business opportunities when used

alone.

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It is recommended that entrepreneurs looking for business opportunities in the field of

microalgae look closely at the resources they have available: like quality of water, the

environment, the weather conditions, and the possibility to inject flue gases and/or waste

water in the farm. Depending on all that, a business model could be made. But not all business

opportunities are viable in a given environment.

It is recommended that entrepreneurs should see how they could add value to every input

and outputs to their process. In terms of outputs, microalgal biomass can be made use of with

no waste production, if well managed. And in terms of inputs, production costs can be

drastically decreased if nutrients are provided from the direct environment of algae farms (like

waste water or flue gases). A SADT7 summarizes some opportunities that are offered to

entrepreneurs developing their business in the field of microalgae (figure 6.5.5).

Figure 6.5.5. Arranged SADT presenting the whole process of growing microalgae with business opportunities

spoken of in the research (on creation)

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7. Conclusion

7.1. Summary of key findings and recommendations for future practice

During this research, it has been found that microalgae present potential for profitable

business-opportunities and mitigation of CO2 emissions. As it is said in a report from the Zero

Emissions Platform (2012, p.11), ―Their fast growth, high oil and biomass yields, widespread

availability, absent (or very reduced) competition with agricultural land, high quality, together

with the versatility of by-products – not to mention efficiency in utilising CO2 – make algae

and aquatic biomass a promising resource.‖

All five objectives made explicit in part 1.2 have been investigated, and key findings, as well

as recommendations for future practice (targeting entrepreneurs, governments, and

researchers) have been summarized for each objective in table 7.1.

Table 7.1. Summary of key findings and recommendations for each objective

Objectives Findings Recommendations

Objective 1

To investigate the

technical and

financial aspects of

growing microalgae

- As supported by both the literature review

and the interviewees, all technologies have

their advantages and drawbacks and choice

of one option in particular is based on the

resources available, the environmental

context, and on the final by-products

targeted

- Production costs keep decreasing as

technology is being developed

- Natural resources and environment

conditions are key for the choice of a

technology and the resulting productivity.

When setting up a company in the field of

microalgae, it is recommended to choose

carefully the location of an algae farm as

part of a major step in the business model.

Eventually, profitability will depend on the

choice of technology which will lead or not

to good yield.

Objective 2

To investigate the

potential of

microalgae to

mitigate carbon

emissions from flue

gas

- Carbon capture from flue gas is a mature

technology for small-scale industry, and

can reduce substantially the production

costs for microalgal biomass while reducing

carbon emissions from flue gas

- it has been found that the existence of

government funding and/or carbon taxes

would drive the growth of this technology

- Carbon capture from flue gas is not a

viable option today for large-scale

industry, as it would require huge areas of

land to fully capture CO2 from big CO2-

emitting industry

- It is recommended that entrepreneurs do

not only use microalgae-carbon capture

from flue gas to generate profits, but

contemplate other sources of incomes to

have a profitable business

- The option of bubbling flue gas directly

in the ocean should be investigated more

closely (especially in terms of

environmental impacts), as it would be a

win-win situation if microalgae worked at

capturing CO2 from flue gas and at

providing feed for fish in the ocean. Some

options could be to create semi-closed

70



- Carbon capture from flue gas with

microalgae requires other sources of

incomes to be profitable. It can help reduce

the production costs of microalgae by

providing free nutrients, and generate some

incomes with governmental funding and

carbon taxes, but other sources of incomes

must be found

spaces in the ocean where to bubble flue

gas.

Objective 3

To identify the main

opportunities and

challenges for the

development of

microalgae-based

technologies

- Still lots of R&D needs to be done in order

for microalgae to make more profitable

business opportunities. This is facilitated by

the fact that microalgae grow very fast,

therefore, research has the potential to be

fast, especially for genome modifications

- It is hard to find people with the right

background and skills in this field

- The level of awareness of people should

be raised regarding microalgae as a way to

reduce carbon emissions and to produce

valuable by-products

- Carbon taxes and governmental

subsidies must be more developed in order

to drive this field, which is still young and

requires lots of investment in R&D

- It is recommended that R&D keeps

going, especially in the field of genetics,

where there is the potential of creating

stronger strains which can grow faster (and

capture CO2 more efficiently) and in more

adverse conditions.

- It is recommended that governments put

more efforts in funding this field, through

subsidies and/or carbon taxes.

- At the same time as they are investing in

microalgae, governments should promote

and advertise their actions, so that people

become more aware of the potential of

microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions.

This could even lead to the apparition of

professional vocations, which would then

reinforce the research and solve the problem

linked to the absence of people with the

right background

Objective 4

To investigate the

potential of

microalgae-based

biofuel to mitigate

carbon emissions,

and as an

alternative to fossil

fuel in the Future

- Apart from some isolated applications,

microalgae-based biofuel is not cost-

effective today. But as costs for petroleum

increase and R&D makes microalgae-

biofuel more and more cost-effective, a time

will come when microalgae-biofuel will

have the potential for competing with

petroleum.

- Microalgae-biofuel has the potential for

reducing net CO2 emissions. Use of

microalgae-biofuel forms a sustainable

cycle where microalgae capture CO2.

Biofuel is produced with microalgal

biomass. And biofuel is burnt, releasing part

of the CO2 back to the atmosphere.

- Even if microalgae-biofuel is not effective

yet, entrepreneurs could work at developing

new technologies, in parallel of using

microalgae for other applications which

would make the business profitable.

Objective 5

To explore activity

- Microalgae businesses have the potential

to reduce net CO2 emissions by (1)

- Entrepreneurs should look closely at what

resources they have available to make the

71



in the field of

microalgae today

and to identify

profitable business

opportunities in the

field of microalgae

to mitigate carbon

emissions

producing microalgae and (2) having

activities whose non-microalgae-based

alternative emit ore CO2.

- Some microalgae by-products are already

very profitable like nutraceuticals and

chemical compounds. But for other

applications, microalgae business-

opportunities must be combined in order

to have a profitable business.

most out of them and fit their business

plan to the resources available. Not the

contrary.

7.2. Limitations

Limitations for this research come from its qualitative nature. Qualitative research is

intrinsically interpretative and depends on the respondents and on the context. Findings and

recommendations could have been different if other respondents had been selected.

In addition, experts were not found for all business opportunities and CO2-reducing

technologies discussed in the literature review, even if respondents interviewed for this

research were able to provide their opinion on this subject. This is due to the fact that some

projects are making their details confidential (in carbon capture from flue gas and in biofuel

production especially) and to the fact that the researcher had limited time to conduct his

research.

Another limitation is due to the inexperience of the researcher for conducting qualitative

researches. Therefore, data may have been damaged during the collection process or during

interpretation. In addition, the researcher is not a native speaker, and conducting interviews in

English may have contributed to this limitation

7.3. What further research could be done

For future research in this field, it would be interesting to conduct case-studies to investigate

the potential of microalgae to mitigate CO2 emissions, in a given environment. To do that,

Life-Cycle analysis could be carried out, as well as quantification of the carbon footprint of

the activity. It could then be compared with the carbon footprint of other similar non-algae-

based activities.

72


Another option for further research includes the identification of the criteria which make a

given microalgae-based business model profitable (in terms of environment, resources

available, political context, socio-economic context).

Finally, further research could be made to create a guidebook for entrepreneurs, which would

contain a list of parameters that would be associated to each business opportunities in the field

of microalgae, and which would help entrepreneurs define their business model for their

microalgae-based business, given the context in which they are and the resources they have at

hand (environmental context, resources available, political context, geographical and socio-

economic context).

7.4. Concluding the dissertation

The aim of this dissertation was to assess business opportunities for microalgae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions. For this purpose, five objectives were defined and

answered throughout the research, thanks to a combination of literature review and interviews

of experts.

This dissertation provides advancement and contribution to academics, by enriching the

current literature on microalgae-based carbon capture and by providing up-to-date

information regarding the state of the research in this field and recommendations for R&D

expressed by experts in this field who are not necessarily academics.

This dissertation provides advancement for entrepreneurs and industry practitioners too, as

viable business opportunities have been identified and confirmed by experts and entrepreneurs

who provided their opinion, their advice, and up-to-date knowledge to this research.

To wind up, this dissertation has presented many benefits for the author, who challenged

himself by undertaking a qualitative research in English in a topic he had initially no

knowledge about: microalgae-based CO2 emissions reduction and business opportunities in

this field. He learnt how to conduct an independent and qualitative research and to write a

Master‘s dissertation in academic English.

73


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Appendix I – Information sheet for interview

July 2014

INFORMATION SHEET Interview for an MSc thesis: Assessing the business

opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of

reducing carbon emissions

You have been invited to participate in an interview that is part of a student research project

titled “Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of

reducing carbon emissions”. Before you decide whether to take part it is important that you

understand why the research is being done and what it will involve. Please take time to read the

following information carefully.

What is the research project?

This research forms an MSc dissertation about the potential for microalgae technologies to

reduce carbon emissions, and current barriers and incentives for the commercialisation of these

technologies.

This research is being carried out by Benoit Robart who is undertaking an MSc. in

Environmental Entrepreneurship at the University of Strathclyde in the Department of Civil and

Environmental Engineering . The project will be completed by the 29th of August 2014.

The aims of this research are

1. to investigate the potential of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions

2. and to offer an exhaustive overview of business opportunities in the field of

microalgae-based technologies, through a study of technologies existing or being

developed, technical challenges, costs (viability), productivity, and scoping of businesses

already being developed in this field.

The results of this research should provide readers of the dissertation with an overview of the

latest developments in this field and helping them investigating opportunities for business

development.

84


Interviews of experts in the field of microalgae technologies (research and industry) are being

carried out to gather their views on the current status of the technology, and the key

opportunities and challenges for entrepreneurs in this field. The experience and knowledge of

these experts, like you, are fundamental to the usefulness of this research project.

What the interview involves for you

Why me? You are provided with this information sheet because you have been selected for

interview because of your expertise and experience in the field of microalgae-based

technologies. Your expertise might be one aspect of the technology, or in setting up a

microalgae-based business and running it, or in another subject related to the field.

What is being asked of me? The interview should take between 30 minutes and 45 minutes,

but its length will depend on how much you would like to say. With your permission an audio

recording will be made, but your name and details will be kept confidential.

Do I have to take part? Your participation for interview is entirely voluntary, and if you decide

to take part, you will be asked to sign a consent form. You can withdraw your consent at any

time without having to give a reason, at which point, any research notes or recordings of our

conversation will be destroyed.

How will data be handled? All data will be collected and handled in accordance with the Data

Protection Act (1998) and the University of Strathclyde’s Data Protection policies. Audio files

will be accessible only to Benoit Robart during the time of the research, will be password

protected and anonymous. Audio files will be destroyed at the end of the research

(30/10/2014).

How will the research be published? The research will form an MSc dissertation. A summary

of the research findings may be published online. You can choose whether or not you wish that

you, or your institution, remain anonymous. This means that your/your insitutions identity will

not be made explicit in any publications relating to this research, nor will you be linked to the

views or information you express during the interview.

Who can I contact about the project?

If you have any questions about the project, during or after this study please do not hesitate to

contact me, Benoit Robart, using the contact details below.

Mr Benoit Robart

Email: [email protected]

Tel: +44(0)7922142054

Address: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

University of Strathclyde

Glasgow (UK)

Any questions or concerns can also be addressed to Dr Jennifer Roberts who is supervising this

research.

Dr Jennifer Roberts

85



Tel: +44(0)141 5483177

This project has been approved by the Departmental Ethics Committee, Department of Civil and

Environmental Engineering, University of Strathclyde. Further questions and information can be

sought from Girma Zawdie, senior lecturer, Email: [email protected], Tel: +44(0)141 548

4443

Thank you for your time

Please keep this sheet for your information

mailto:[email protected]

86


Appendix II – Consent form for interview

INTERVIEW CONSENT FORM

Interview for an MSc thesis: Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of reducing carbon emissions.

Dear Participant,

Thank you for agreeing to take part in this research. The interview is being undertaken by

Benoit Robart as part of a data collection process for a dissertation which forms part of an MSc.

in Environmental Entrepreneurship, at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,

University of Strathclyde (Glasgow, UK). The information gathered during the interview

conversation will be used to draw an overview of the business opportunities for microalgae

technologies as a means of mitigating carbon emissions. We hope that you will enjoy the

interview process.

Please read the project information sheet and ask questions about the research before

completing and returning this consent form.

To carry out this research, we need your formal consent that you understand the purpose of

being involved and that you agree to take part. We do not anticipate there to be any risks

associated with your participation but you have the right to withdraw from the research at any

time. All data will be collected and handed in accordance with the Data Protection Act (1998)

and the University of Strathclyde’s Data Protection policies.

Statement of consent:

1. I confirm that I have read and understood the information sheet for this study (dated July 2014) on “Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of reducing carbon emissions.

2. I understand that my participation is completely voluntary and that I am free to withdraw at any time and without having to give a reason. I understand also that I can ask to have any information/opinion that I have provided withdrawn from the study at any time.

3. I have had an opportunity to ask any questions that I have about this research, and understand that I should feel free to contact the researchers with any other questions regarding this research that I might have in the future.

4. I understand that data collected during the study may be looked at by responsible individuals from the research team. I give permission for these individuals to have access information I have provided.

5. For this study, I would prefer that (tick the boxes that indicate your preference): My name and the name of my company will be anonymous Only my name will be anonymous Only the name of my company will be anonymous My name and the name of my company will be made explicit in the acknowledgements My name and the name of my company will be made explicit in the report

87


6. I agree to this interview being audio recorded: the recorded audio file would then be used only by the investigator (Benoit Robart) and would be destroyed at the end of the research (30/10/2014):

yes no

7. I agree to being interviewed for this study.

Name of Participant Date Signature

The research is being done as part of a master’s research project which will be completed August 2014, the 29th. If you are interested in learning about the research findings, I would be delighted to provide you with a project summary or a copy of the thesis. Please indicate which information you would prefer and provide a contact email address:

I would like to have a summary of the research findings at the end of the process (tick the right box):

yes no

I would like to be sent a PDF copy of the dissertation at the end of the process (tick the right box):

yes no Please provide your preferred contact email address below:

You may contact the researcher at any time. Contact details are at the end of the information

sheet

If you have any concerns regarding your rights as a participant in this study, you may contact the

Chair of the Ethics Committee at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,

University of Strathclyde:

Girma Zawdie, senior lecturer, Email: [email protected], Tel: +44(0)141 548 4443

88


Appendix III – Questions for interview and format

MSc project: Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae

technologies as a means of reducing carbon emissions

Interview questions and format

[Introduction]

Hello ―Name of the participant‖,

Thank you for accepting to take part in this research on business opportunities for

entrepreneurs in the field of algae-based solutions to mitigate carbon emissions. .

My name is Benoit Robart, I am undertaking a Masters in Environmental Entrepreneurship at

the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow.

I am writing my thesis on the topic of using microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions and

identify business opportunities in this field. This interview and the answers you provide me

will help me address this topic.

Because you have an expertise in the field of [expertise of the participant], I would value your

experience and your opinion very much in my research.

Before we start, I just want to just go over some things with you again.

Firstly, thank you for agreeing to take part and for completing the consent form / prompt to

complete the consent form. Please do remember that you can withdraw from the study at any

time.

, I want to double check that you would prefer for your name and the name of your company

[to be named / remain anonymous] in the acknowledgements?

As you will have read, I would like to record the interview so that I can focus on our

discussion. Can I check that you quite happy with this?

Excellent. Before we start, I expect that this interview will take between 30 and 45 minutes.

Are you available for that time period? xxx if not – arrange to call back

Brilliant. Thank you,

Now I will start with a few questions, about your background in this topic and current

activity.

89


Introduction

1. Could you introduce yourself and a broad overview of your current activity or involvement

in the field of microalgae technology? (background, experience with algae?)

Examples of probing questions:

What would you say are your main areas of expertise?

What is your current role?

What is your experience with algae based solutions.

What motivated you to work with microalgae?

[Bridge]

Thank you very much for this very complete overview of your background and activities. Now I would like to

ask you more details on the project you are working on.

Details on the algae-related project

2. Could you please explain in a little more detail the algae-related project on which you are

working?

Examples of probing questions:

(How, When, What, Why, Who?).

What is the background of the project?

How it came about?

What is its current status? How long has it been ongoing for?

What are the development opportunities?

Is your project profitable yet?

How are you driving profits?

What are your plans for the Future?

[Bridge]

Great! That is very interesting. Now, I would like to ask you some general questions about your opinion on

technology and your preferences.

Technology

3. What technology to produce algae do you prefer? What are your reasons for this?

Probing questions: According to you, what are the biggest advantages and drawbacks

of this technology? What is your favourite harvesting technique?

4. What species are you growing? What are your reasons for this particular species?

Probing question: What is your yielding (g/L/day)?

[Bridge]

These questions are more suited for business workers

(not to be asked to e.g. researchers)

90


Brilliant! You gave me some very interesting insights on technologies to produce and harvest microalgae. I now

would like to ask you questions related to economy of your microalgae-base technology/project. Please feel free

to tell me if I am asking you for confidential data.

Economy

(Distinction to be made between questions which target researchers R and/or business

workers B)

5. How do you make algae-based solutions profitable? Where do you get money from? (R&B)

(if possible, can you provide an approximate yielding in a unit like £/kg dry biomass or £/m2

or production costs in £/m3?)

Probing questions:

Do you have any subsidies? If yes, where do they come from? (R&B)

What is the initial investment (R&B) and when will it pay off (B)?

How easy was it to get investment (R&B)? How can this be improved (R&B)?

What would make algae-based projects like yours more profitable (B)?

At the end, how could you make the outcomes of this project profitable(R)?

6. (B)Who are your customers? For how much do you sell [algae] to them? How do these

persons/this company use these [algae]?

[Bridge]

Thank you very much for all your answers, these are very relevant for my research. Now we are entering the

second half of the interview, and I am going to ask you questions about your opinion on the viability of using

microalgae to reduce carbon emissions.

Algae used to mitigate carbon emissions. Potential, opportunities, challenges

7. Do you think algae will play a role in carbon mitigation and which algae-based

technologies look to be the most feasible economically speaking? Now? In the next few

decades?

8. In your opinion, what are the three main opportunities for the development of algae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions? (technological, maintenance, economic, social,

environmental, political)

9. In your opinion, what are the three main barriers to the development of algae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions? (technological, maintenance, economic, social,

environmental, political)

10. In your opinion, what would be the most viable algae-based solution to mitigate carbon

emissions?

91


Probing question: In your opinion, what are the most profitable technologies and

activities that you can implement using algae, and which would have a direct or

indirect positive impact on carbon emissions?

[Bridge]

Thank you very much for your opinion. Our interview is coming close to an end. I have only three questions left

to ask you on your opinion for biofuels, drivers for microalgae businesses and your favourite business

opportunity.

Microalgae-based biofuels, opening, favourite business opportunities

11. What is your opinion on the use of biofuel as a subsidiary of fossil fuel? Do you think

algae could be used to capture carbon in the atmosphere, and then be turned into biofuel

which would be burnt and release carbon into the atmosphere, thus creating a sustainable

cycle? Why?

12. What would drive the growth of microalgae-based technologies to mitigate carbon

emissions? (funds, carbon taxes, ccs?)

13. Last but not least, if you were to set up a company in the field of microalgae, what activity

would you invest in? According to you, are there opportunities for entrepreneurs in the field

of microalgae? And what are they?

Conclusion

Do you have further questions? Or would you like to make comments?

Debriefing and information on the next steps of the research

Would you like to add something to these questions?

Do you know other persons with whom I could discuss of this subject?

Thank you for answering all these questions, this is very helpful for the research I am

undertaking.

As said in the consent form, All your answers will be kept on my computer (and only on it)

for the duration of the research, and will be deleted afterwards.

I shall send you the summary of my research and/or a pdf copy of my dissertation once it is

finished.

Again thank you very much.

Have a nice [day/evening]

92


Appendix IV – Information sheet for questionnaire

July 2014

INFORMATION SHEET Questionnaire for an MSc thesis: Assessing the business


reducing carbon emissions

You have been invited to participate in a questionnaire that is part of a student research project

titled “Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of

reducing carbon emissions”. Before you decide whether to take part it is important that you

understand why the research is being done and what it will involve. Please take time to read the

following information carefully.

What is the research project?

This research forms an MSc dissertation about the potential for microalgae technologies to

reduce carbon emissions, and current barriers and incentives for the commercialisation of these

technologies.

This research is being carried out by Benoit Robart who is undertaking an MSc. in

Environmental Entrepreneurship at the University of Strathclyde in the Department of Civil and

Environmental Engineering . The project will be completed by the 29th of August 2014.

The aims of this research are

1. to investigate the potential of microalgae to mitigate carbon emissions

2. and to offer as exhaustive as possible an overview of business opportunities in the

field of microalgae-based technologies, through a study of technologies existing or

being developed, technical challenges, costs (viability), productivity, and scoping of

businesses already being developed in this field.

The results of this research should provide readers of the dissertation with an overview of the

latest developments in this field and helping them investigating opportunities for business

development.

93


Questionnaires are being sent to experts in the field of microalgae technologies (research and

industry) to gather their views on the current status of the technology, and the key opportunities

and challenges for entrepreneurs in this field. The experience and knowledge of these experts,

like you, are fundamental to the usefulness of this research project.

What answering this questionnaire involves for you

Why me? You are provided with this information sheet because you have been selected to

answer this questionnaire because of your expertise and experience in the field of microalgae-

based technologies. Your expertise might be one aspect of the technology, or in setting up a

microalgae-based business and running it, or in another subject related to the field.

What is being asked of me? The questionnaire should take between 30 minutes and 45

minutes to fill, but its length will depend on how much you would like to write.

Do I have to take part? Your participation to this questionnaire is entirely voluntary, and if you

decide to take part, you will be asked to sign a consent form. You can withdraw your consent at

any time without having to give a reason, at which point, any research notes or recordings of our

conversation will be destroyed.

How will data be handled? All data will be collected and handled in accordance with the Data

Protection Act (1998) and the University of Strathclyde’s Data Protection policies. Copy of your

answers will be accessible only to Benoit Robart during the time of the research, will be

password protected and anonymous. They will be destroyed at the end of the research

(30/10/2014).

How will the research be published? The research will form an MSc dissertation. A summary

of the research findings may be published online. You can choose whether or not you wish that

you, or your institution, remain anonymous. This means that your/your insitutions identity will

not be made explicit in any publications relating to this research, nor will you be linked to the

views or information you express in the questionnaire.

Who can I contact about the project?

If you have any questions about the project, during or after this study please do not hesitate to

contact me, Benoit Robart, using the contact details below.

Mr Benoit Robart


Tel: +44(0)7922142054

Address: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

University of Strathclyde

Glasgow (UK)

Any questions or concerns can also be addressed to Dr Jennifer Roberts who is supervising this

research.

Dr Jennifer Roberts



94


Tel: +44(0)141 5483177

This project has been approved by the Departmental Ethics Committee, Department of Civil and

Environmental Engineering, University of Strathclyde. Further questions and information can be

sought from Girma Zawdie, senior lecturer, Email: [email protected], Tel: +44(0)141 548

4443

Thank you for your time

Please keep this sheet for your information

95


Appendix V – Consent form for questionnaire

QUESTIONNAIRE CONSENT FORM

Questionnaire for an MSc thesis: Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of reducing carbon emissions.

Dear Participant,

Thank you for agreeing to take part in this research,which is being undertaken by Benoit Robart

as part of a data collection process for a dissertation which forms part of an MSc. in

Environmental Entrepreneurship, at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,

University of Strathclyde (Glasgow, UK). The information gathered in the questionnaire will be

used to draw an overview of the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means

of mitigating carbon emissions. We hope that you will enjoy the questionnaire process.

Please read the project information sheet and ask questions about the research before

completing and returning this consent form.

To carry out this research, we need your formal consent that you understand the purpose of

being involved and that you agree to take part. We do not anticipate there to be any risks

associated with your participation but you have the right to withdraw from the research at any

time. All data will be collected and handed in accordance with the Data Protection Act (1998)

and the University of Strathclyde’s Data Protection policies.

Statement of consent:

1. I confirm that I have read and understood the information sheet for this study (dated July 2014) on “Assessing the business opportunities for microalgae technologies as a means of reducing carbon emissions.

2. I understand that my participation is completely voluntary and that I am free to withdraw at any time and without having to give a reason. I understand also that I can ask to have any information/opinion that I have provided withdrawn from the study at any time.

3. I have had an opportunity to ask any questions that I have about this research, and understand that I should feel free to contact the researchers with any other questions regarding this research that I might have in the future.

4. I understand that data collected during the study may be looked at by responsible individuals from the research team. I give permission for these individuals to have access information I have provided.

5. For this study, I would prefer that (tick the boxes that indicate your preference): My name and the name of my company will be anonymous Only my name will be anonymous Only the name of my company will be anonymous My name and the name of my company will be made explicit in the acknowledgements My name and the name of my company will be made explicit in the report

96


6. I understand that the copy of the questionnaire I send back will be used only by the investigator (Benoit Robart) and will be destroyed at the end of the research (30/10/2014):

7. I agree to participate to this study.

Name of Participant Date Signature

The research is being done as part of a master’s research project which will be completed August 2014, the 29th. If you are interested in learning about the research findings, I would be delighted to provide you with a project summary or a copy of the thesis. Please indicate which information you would prefer and provide a contact email address:

I would like to have a summary of the research findings at the end of the process (tick the right box):

yes no

I would like to be sent a PDF copy of the dissertation at the end of the process (tick the right box):

yes no Please provide your preferred contact email address below:

You may contact the researcher at any time. Contact details are at the end of the information

sheet

If you have any concerns regarding your rights as a participant in this study, you may contact the

Chair of the Ethics Committee at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,

University of Strathclyde:

Girma Zawdie, senior lecturer, Email: [email protected], Tel: +44(0)141 548 4443

97


Appendix VI – Questionnaire

List of questions for the dissertation ―Assessing the business


reducing carbon emissions‖

Thank you for accepting to take part in this research on business opportunities for entrepreneurs in

the field of algae-based solutions to mitigate carbon emissions.

My name is Benoit Robart and I am conducting this research for a MSc. thesis submitted as part

completion for a MSc. in Environmental Entrepreneurship at the department of Civil and

Environmental Engineering at the University of Strathclyde, in Glasgow.

The goals of this research are to draw an overview as exhaustive as possible of the business

opportunities in the field of microalgae, in order to mitigate anthropogenic carbon emissions,

directly or indirectly.

Below is the list of questions that I would like to ask you. Because my research is exploratory and as

the questions below were initially designed for an interview in which I would have been able to

bounce on what you are telling and ask you additional questions to invite you to elaborate, I would

be very grateful if you could answer these questions giving as many details as you can and if you

could develop when you think you could provide useful information that are not asked directly in

the questions below.

The answers to this questionnaire and data collected will be used to compare business

opportunities in the field of microalgae and to determine if microalgae could have a place in the

fight against carbon emissions in the future.

As stated in the consent form and in the information sheet, data are anonymous and you can

withdraw from the study at any time.

Introduction

1. Could you introduce yourself and your activity?

(Background, experience with algae-based solutions? Your main area of expertise and your current

role? Why you decided to work with microalagae?)

98


Details on the algae-related project

2. Could you please explain the algae-related project on which you are working?

(Please say what is the background of the project, how it came about, what its current status is,

how long it has been on-going for, what are the development opportunities for your project, how

you are driving profits)

Technology (please answer when relevant)

3. What technology to produce algae do you prefer? What technology to harvest algae do you

prefer? What are your reasons for this? (According to you, what are the biggest advantages and

drawbacks of this technology?)

4. What species are you growing? What are your reasons for this particular species?

(If possible, say what is your yielding (g/L/day))

Economy (please answer when relevant)

5. How do you make algae-based solutions profitable? Where do you get money from?

(If possible, can you provide a yielding in a unit like £/kg or £/m2 or production

costs in £/m3? Say if you have subsidies and if yes, where they come from. Say how

easy was it to get investment and how this can be improved)

99


6. Who are you customers? What is your product? For how much do you sell your product to

them? What do your sellers manufacture with the algae you sell to them?

Algae used to mitigate carbon emissions. Potential, opportunities,

challenges

7. Do you think algae will play a role in carbon mitigation and which algae-based technologies

look to be the most feasible economically speaking? Now? In the next few decades?

8. In your opinion, what are the three main opportunities for the development of algae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions?

(technological, maintenance, economic, social, environmental, political)

9. In your opinion, what are the three main barriers to the development of algae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions?

(technological, maintenance, economic, social, environmental, political)

Microalgae-based biofuels, opening, favourite business opportunities

10. In your opinion, what would be the most viable algae-based solution to mitigate carbon

emissions?

(Quote a solution and explain quickly why this solution is the most viable for carbon mitigation and

the most profitable economically speaking)

100


11. What is your opinion on the use of biofuel as a subsidiary of fossil fuel? Do you think algae

could be used to capture carbon in the atmosphere, and then be turned into biofuel which would

be burnt and release carbon into the atmosphere, thus creating a sustainable cycle?

(Give your view on the potential of microalgae to make biofuels)

12. What would drive the growth of microalgae-based technologies to mitigate carbon

emissions? (Funds, carbon taxes, ccs, mentalities?)

13. Last but not least, if you were to set up a company in the field of microalgae, what activity

would you invest in? According to you, are there opportunities for entrepreneurs in the field of

microalgae? And where do they lie?

Conlusion

Would you like to make comments or would you like to add something to this questionnaire?

Do you know other persons with whom I could discuss of this subject?

Thank you for answering this questionnaire, this is very helpful for the research I am undertaking.

As said in the consent form, please note that your answers will be kept on my computer (and only

on it) for the duration of the research, and will be deleted afterwards.

I shall send you the summary of my research and/or a pdf copy of my dissertation once it is finished.

Best wishes,

Benoît Robart

101


Appendix VII – Advertisement

This is a sample of advertisement that would be posted on social network

groups related to algae to ask for volunteers to answer the interview.

―Hello/Good morning/Good afternoon

As a postgraduate student writing my dissertation on the potential of microalgae-based

technologies to mitigate carbon emissions and the definition of where business opportunities

lie in this field, I am looking for volunteers to be interviewed.

The interview would be made through a videoconference and should last for about 20-30

minutes depending on how much you want to elaborate on your answers, and it would really

help me if you could participate.

Results of my research will be provided to people accepting to participate.

Thank you very much for your time,

Have a nice day

Benoit Robart‖

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Appendix VIII – Advertising Email/cover letter

This is an example of email/cover letter that could be sent to potential

interviewees to ask for their participation to the research

Dear [named contact / Sir or Madam],

Re: Research Project Interviews

I am a postgraduate student studying for an MSc in Environmental Entrepreneurship at the

University of Strathclyde and as part of my degree I am carrying out a study on ―What is the

potential for carbon emissions reduction from micro-algae based technologies, and where are

the business opportunities?” And as such I am seeking to collect data on the potential and the

applications of algae for helping mitigate carbon emissions and on where business

opportunities lie.

My intention is to seek interview data from entrepreneurs and researchers and use this data to

test the research question. I understand that you are involved in this area of activity and I am

hoping you would be willing to participate in my research project. I would be grateful if you

would be willing to be interviewed.

If you choose so, this will be an anonymous interview: any information provided will be

assessed confidentially with no individual being identified in the course of analysis unless

prior agreement is given. The interview should take approximately 30 minutes to complete

and would be done through a videoconference. If you do not have time to grant me an

interview, I would be obliged if you could fill a questionnaire that I would send you and

return it by the end of July.

If you want, a summary of my research could be sent to you at the end.

For enquiries related to the research project/interview please send me an email at

[email protected]. For further information or queries please contact myself

or my supervisor, Dr jennifer Roberts, [email protected].

I look forward to hearing from you and thank you in advance for your assistance.

[Yours sincerely / faithfully],

Benoit Robart


103


Appendix IX – Answers to the interviews

Interview 1 - Rhona

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Rhona

(37min) USA Business

Algae

cultivation

consultant

+15

years

Expert in the field of microalgae strain selection

(knowing more than 3,000 strains of microalgae),

consultant for companies regarding the optimal

choice of strains for their activities and

optimisation of microalgae productivity

Topic Idea

Background

Consultant for microalgae companies whose activity is linked to carbon

sequestration, to food product, or to pharmaceuticals. Her role is to

maintain sustainable algae biomass production in a predictable way.

Specialized in growing microalgae at the University and learnt how to grow

3,000 strains of microalgae.

Projects on which the interviewee is

working on

The projects on which the interviewee is working involve three markets:

1. Carbon capture from power plants with biomass

2. Pharmaceuticals production

3. Animal food production

Which strains of microalgae do you use?

Choice of strains for a microalgae-company activity is highly dependent on

a list of criteria defined by the company or by the process involved.

―It starts with a business model and finding algae that will produce with

this business model.‖

Criteria to grow algae and how it works

It depends on the characteristics of the microalgae strain:

- ―You have to define the nutrients it needs

- For the business model side of it, you have to define what you need to

grow, what you need to produce, what product do you want out of the

algae.

- Once you have that, you have to define the needs of the algae to grow in

your environment. In terms of light intensity.‖

Technology to grow microalgae -

Open ponds versus photobioreactors

Microalgae can grow in adverse conditions and there is no optimal

technology to grow microalgae. It depends on the purpose of your business.

Technologies to grow microalgae are often derived from exiting systems

with other applications.

You can use wastewater treatment applications and try to apply it to

growing algae.

―I like photobioreactors. I use photobioreactors. I like open ponds systems.

I use open ponds systems. To tell people what they should use depend on

the resources they have.‖ It depends on the business model and the

resources people have. For example, in some places, people can have water

for almost nothing. In that case, open ponds systems may be the best

choice. If water is a scarce and expensive resource, then photobioreactors

may be more viable economically speaking. Some places have many acres

to sequestrate carbon dioxide with microalgae, some other places don‘t.

The technology is highly dependent on the environment.

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―All systems have their pluses and minuses, there is no perfect system.‖

Key points to start and run a viable

microalgae business

In order to businesses to work, ―not only the right people are needed, but

funding to go along with it‖. Consistent source of funding and hiring the

good people are key.

- ―It doesn‘t have to be a lot of funding but it does have to be consistent‖.

―Some people fail because they don‘t spend it wisely and then they have

nothing‖.

- ―Some people fail because they simply don‘t hire the good people for

their business model to work‖. ―Most experts in this field are in their over

70s and it is hard to make them speak with young entrepreneurs‖. Sources

of knowledge are limited and it is hard to find the good people to work

with.

Opportunities for the development of

microalgae

Opportunities ―have everything to do with your resources, your water, what

you have around you to make this work.

What you look at to get your business work is what resources you have for

free, the water quality, the space available, the goals for your production

(food, pharmaceuticals), the productivity you target

Challenges in the industry of microalgae ―The biggest challenge is the people‖. Funding can easily be obtained if the

business model is viable. But good people are hard to find.

Microalgae for carbon sequestration

People are already using microalgae to sequestrate carbon from power

plants‘ flue gases. It is working and algae are doing what they are supposed

to. ―The viability of using microalgae to capture carbon from flue gas

depends on the other resources you have on hand: so do you have waste

water, do you have hard water, do you have salt water, do you have

freshwater? Do you have more alkaline water? Do you have more ascetic

water? All of these things are major factors to picking something out.

Thanks god algae is as diverse for saying we have so many factors to do

with.‖

Examples of figures for the productivity

of microalgae

It depends on the system. ―Some people can grow very densely, in

photobioreactors‖. Open ponds production is usually less dense.

―The magic numbers are to find how much to grow to make money out of

it‖.

Drivers for the development of

microalgae industry

- ―Having younger educated people‖ with at once ―a microbiology

background and an engineering background as well‖. ―People that actually

know how to build a system for the organisms they are trying to grow‖.

Strains that people use to make money

out of it

―There are only seven strains that I know of that are approved by the

government for consumption‖. Spirulina is the most common.

Microalgae-based biofuel

―Oil we use in our cars now comes from algae back in the dinosaurs‘ days‖.

We just have to reproduce the process of making oil at a faster pace. Algae

are already used to make oil like DHA, EPA and jet fuel‖. ―There are

people in California that already advertise that their fuel comes from algae.

―It is very foreseeable that algae will play a role‖ in energy production in

the future.

The point currently is ―are people ready to pay more for a fuel that is

green?‖

105


Interview 2 - Robert

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Robert

(1h07min) USA Business Entrepreneur

+35

years

Entrepreneur and sole proprietor of his business

of growing microalgae for oil and nutraceuticals –

Designer of a raceway and a photobioreactor

(patent-protected), inventor of one solution to

harvest microalgae and two solutions to extract

oil out of dried algae. Author of an e-book: The

great Algae adventure (2013)

Topic Idea

Background

The interviewee has a background in entrepreneurship and he became

interested in algae as a source of oil that could be used as feedstock for

biodiesel.


working on

―[In my project], the idea is to grow algae and extract oil and turn it into

biodiesel and then use what is left over to use as food for fish. There are

two project streams for the company: the first one is oil and the second is

fish food.

The problem with fish is that the highest expense is in feed for the fishes.

We can use algae to replace one third of the cost of the fish.‖

Technology to grow microalgae

―Photobioreactors are essentially a container. Their advantage is that there

is an inside and an outside. If you put algae in the inside, then everything

that is outside cannot get in. And that is the main advantage of

photobioreactors: the advantage is that you can control everything. The

disadvantage is that you have to control everything. With my

photobioreactor, I neglected to control the temperature at first, and in

summer, I killed the algae. There are things that you have to control like the

gas exchange.

I figured that operating in raceways is much easier than in

photobioreactors. But for some products you are not able to do this because

if your product is going to be consumed as food, you have to be able to

know that it is not contaminated with something else. So for food

production you have to use photobioreactors. You have to guarantee that

there is no contamination.

I was able to avoid contamination in open ponds raceways by using

polyculture. What you do is that you put more than one algae together, and

if you select them properly, there is a synergy. Each one will help the other.

I use Chlorella and Euglena with Nitrogen fixing bacteria and that works

very well. But the Euglena eats the Chlorella. But it does not digest them.

It kinds of keep them internally in their private garden and protect them.‖

Harvesting techniques

To separate microalgae and water, several techniques were tried by the

interviewee:

- The interviewee tried a home-made technique at first, using pillow cases

to filtrate microalgae and water with the help of gravity. ‗I like the

microfiltration technique‖.

- Another approach used by the interviewee was to use chemicals to

agglomerate microalgae (flocculation) and filter them afterwards.

- Electric coagulation was tried by the interviewee too: this technic consist

in applying a high voltage to the container to make the microalgae group

106


around one electrode.

- Another technique tried by the interviewee consisted in bubbling air in the

mix, which makes microalgae group at the surface, transported by the

bubbles.

Interviewee has been using two techniques to expel microalgae out of the

mix: Cream separator which works thanks to centrifuge force and screw

separator which works thanks to a screw which presses the mix.

Issues that the interviewee has been

meeting during his project

- As an entrepreneur, the main issue for the interviewee was to get money

to start his business

- Another issue has to deal with USA regulations: microalgae for food

production need to follow a protocol of food safety and production must be

controlled and grown in photobioreactors to avoid contamination and get a

pure strain. In case of contamination, the entire batch is lost.

Production costs Costs to produce dry microalgae biomass are approximately $2 a pound

Productivity

With photobioreactors and addition of nutrients like starch and sugar,

productivity has reached 115 g/L (in one week). It corresponds to a

productivity of 15 g/m2/Day. ―15 g/m

2/Day is doable. We used to have an

average yield of 17 g/m2/Day. My strategy is, I will feed the 300 gallons of

culture in raceways 5 pounds of sugar and 5 pounds of organic fertilizer for

the first five days. And my thinking is this: with any kind of agriculture,

you need to purchase the best genetic material you can afford and then feed

it the best that you can at the beginning, to get a good start, because then it

grows robust and strong.‖

―Mixotrophic growth is a combination of autotrophic and hetotrophic‖.

Mixotrophic growth (microalgae use both sun and CO2 through the process

of photosynthesis as a source of energy and they use sugar and starch too)

is the most productive way of growing microalgae, according to the

interviewee. ‗Yielding of over 125 g/m2/day have been recorded using

mixotrophic growth‖.

―The good news is that it is possible to get high productivity. The bad news

is that you have to pay to get it‖. Fertilizer and manure can be used to

provide extra nutrients to microalgae. ―I use manure, which is available

here for 1$ a bag, which is about 20 pounds. It works fine. Unfortunately,

once you use the manure, then you have introduced contamination

potentially, and so for food product, this just don‘t work, you can‘t do it.‖

Carbon mitigation with microalgae Using carbon dioxide from power plants to feed microalgae is already done

in the United States and in Mexico.

Business opportunities for entrepreneurs

defined by the interviewee

- Use of agricultural run-off to provide water and nutrients at the same time

for microalgae farms, while recycling this water. Agricultural run-off

poured in water bodies lead to eutrophication and using microalgae to

recycle agricultural water is one way to avoid this environmental disaster.

- Microalgae for food market is the most viable option according to the

interviewee. Very high profit margin can be reached, as production of

biomass costs approximately $2 per pound and final product costs

approximately $20 per pound. ―The good thing for food market is that some

species are already cultivated for food consumption so there is no

controversy‖. Customers for microalgae-nutraceuticals is wide: ―I have

made a Superfood factory business plan (business plan for a company

which makes health supplements with microalgae) and there are more than

500 pages of names of companies, health food stores, that will be the

market for capsules or tablets of algae.‖

―The approach that I have taken in the business plan I have sent you is the

only thing that seems to make sense at this time. Because there is an

opportunity of making a product that you can produce for a low price and

selling for a high price. And there seems to be a market for it. There are

many opportunities that would be impractical for entrepreneurs, because of

the high R&D costs that would be involved in bringing that to market‖.

107


- ―Plastics made with microalgae are probably gonna be a big thing in the

future. There are two or three compounds that you can extract from the

algae to make plastics. The condition here is crude oil. As the price of

crude oil increases, it becomes more competitive to use algae to make

plastics.‖ ―The problem with plastics is that they will require lots of

Research and Development. And the standards are very high‖.

-

Potential for microalgae-based biofuel as

a subsidiary of fossil fuel

―Microalgae-based biofuel is definitely in the Future‖. ―Biodiesel is better

for the environment than petrodiesel‖. ―I think [use of microalgae-based

biofuel as an alternative to fossil fuel] is something that is going to happen.

If we continue to use petroleum products, then petroleum products are

going to increase in price. And this is going to be what will drive the algae-

based solutions. I don‘t see a quick turnaround for this. I think it is going to

take some time. We are not going to run out of oil. What we are going to

run out of is cheap easy oil. Oil that is easy to extract.‖

108


Interview 3 - Brennan

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Brennan

(25min) India Business Director

+25

years

Director of a company which makes nutritional

products out of microalgae.

Consultancy for algae companies, specialized in

nutrition out of algae and the growth of diatoms.

Topic Idea

Background

At first, he was a researcher making research on photosynthesis. He figured

out growing diatoms (a species of microalgae) to produce food would be

very profitable and scalable and decided to start his company. He is a

consultant for other algae companies too.


working on

- Making products like health-supplements and animal food

- Microalgae used for sewage treatment

- R&D: carbon capture on a wide scale and biofuel production

Ways of mitigating carbon emissions

with microalgae

- One option is to build open ponds near industry but it is quite expensive

- The second option is to grow microalgae in the ocean, which is highly

scalable. But environmental issues must be considered.

Viability of using algae for carbon

sequestration

―I believe that algae is the only viable solution for carbon mitigation.

Nothing else is going to solve the problem. Growing diatoms in the ocean

is THE solution. It is based on the diatoms photosynthesis bio reaction. We

can inject flue gases in the ocean and grow diatoms at this place. These

diatoms are consumed by fishes or other organisms in the ocean bath."

―The by-product would be fishes. As a consequence the population of

fishes would increase, and it would solve the problem of food. Now

populations of fishes are decreasing. And we need more food.‖

Foreseeable implementation of carbon

sequestration with microalgae

―The thing is: we are ready for implementation‖, in terms of technical

knowledge. But it will take time to implement: ―scientific amenities are not

ready‖.

―We need to convince people to start to use it on a large scale‖. ―It is gonna

take time because pilot scale must be validated‖.

How the company is making profits - selling of nutraceuticals made out of microalgae

- manufacture of animal food for aquaculture

Profitability of the company ―Our company is recent and in our business model, we are not selling our

items yet. We are profitable because of the subsidies‖.

Technology to produce microalgae

―I prefer open ponds. The advantage is that prices are very low. We can

make sure that our ponds are not contaminated with other species like blue-

green algae. And if it does, we can just clean it, and the price of a batch is

very low‖

Productivity ―Our company is currently producing 1g/L/day‖

Challenges for the development of

microalgae-based technologies to


- For ―production in a large scale, we need to grow the best type of algae‖

- ―We must find solutions to solve the side-effects like contamination‖

- ―Authorities must be convinced of the potential of microalgae for food

production and for carbon sequestration. After that subsidies will help

development of business‖. ―The main barrier for large scale development is

approval by the government‖.

Use of microalgae to produce biofuel in

the future.

Microalgae-based biofuel has the potential to mitigate carbon emissions. It

forms a cycle in which microalgae capture carbon dioxide from the

atmosphere and are converted into biofuel. Then biofuel is burnt and

109


carbon is released back into the atmosphere, but it is then captured again by

microalgae for biofuel production.

―Replacing petroleum with algae oil has to be done‖. ―Better technologies

need to be developed‖.

Main driver for microalgae industry

development

-―Acceptance by people of new microalgae things‖

- ―Acceptance that algae is a good food‖

―Once algae are accepted, we can start combine different productions of

by-products like fish food and biofuel. But right now acceptance is not

there‖.

- ―Technology is there. Acceptance is not there‖;

Opportunities for entrepreneurs currently

- Making food with microalgae: human health supplements or food for

animals like fishes.

- ―Competing with petroleum now is difficult because it is still too cheap‖.

But comes a time when it will be ―competitive to produce algae biofuel‖.

110


Interview 4 - Prakash

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Prakash

(32min) India

Research

for industry

Product

developer +5 years

Developing processes for natural ingredients from

microbial sources specially microalgae

Topic Idea

Background of the interviewee The interviewee is a project leader for a company which manufactures

health-benefits compounds. He has a background in biological engineering.


working on

The interviewee is working on a process which enables to grow microalgae

independently of agricultural uncertainties like the rainfalls, the soil

condition, the atmosphere. Organisms for which the process is being

developed are fungi, bacteria and microalgae.

More precisely, the interviewee is developing this process for micro-

organisms which produce Lutein, which is an antioxidant and a pigment,

present in some strains of microalgae.


The interviewee is growing microalgae in open ponds and in

photobioreactors. Open ponds are actually covered ponds. ―‖The difference

is that the ponds are put under a greenhouse kind of thing. The greenhouse

helps control temperature. It also enables control of air humidity. It is not

absolutely open but it is not close also.‖

The use of photobioreactors or open ponds depends on the compounds

grown by the interviewee.

Details on open ponds versus

photobioreactors (advantages and

drawbacks)

‖Open ponds do not cost much money. The capital expenditure is less on

open ponds. The disadvantage of open ponds is that you are very much

dependent upon the sun light; you are very much dependent upon the

environmental conditions. So that is not good conditions when you grow

for health beneficial compounds.‖ ―Contamination can be brought to the

compounds‖. Therefore it is less suitable for health beneficial compounds.

Productivities are very different too: In open ponds, under the same

condition, productivity is about 4 g/L of dry biomass, whereas it is about 40

g/L in photobioreactors. ―The productivity of dry biomass is almost ten

times. It is a huge difference, but at the same times the costs are very high

for photobioreactors‖.

―Photobioreactors have another advantage. You can keep photobioreactors

in two conditions. One is you put them under the sun light. It is a close

system which uses sunlight. Whereas another option is you have the

photobioreactor but you keep it under artificial light. And the advantage is

that you are not dependent upon the sun so you do not have to worry about

the weather conditions‖.

Profitability of the microalgae-based

compounds developed by the company

of the interviewee

The company of the interviewee is producing microalgae biomass and

extracting molecules out of microalgal biomass for three times less than

marketed prices for the molecule. Microalgae for nutraceuticals is a high-

profit margin market.

Microalgae for mitigating carbon

emissions

Microalgae ―are a good technology and could definitely solve the problem

of carbon emissions. But what is required is – there is a lack of funds I

guess. And there are lots of risks involved. So people are not much willing

to invest into this.‖ ―Even if the Economics were on track, a lot of R&D is

still required. But there are very few things that capture CO2 and release O2

so there is potential. And you remember computers used to be the size of a

111


room and now they are the size of your palm. So technology changes very

fast, so you never know. Especially with microalgae where R&D is three

times faster than with any other plant. And they are simpler than plants, you

can manipulate them. You can modify the genome of algae. It is a matter of

time‖.

Drivers for the development of

microalgae-based technologies to


According to the interviewee, the drivers will be the funds from

governments, as millions of dollars are required to make the technology

mature and entrepreneurs do not have that much money to invest in R&D.

Microalgae for biofuel production

The interviewee thinks that in the future, microalgae-based biofuels will

replace fossil fuel. But not in a near Future. Entrepreneurs who invest in

biofuel production today ultimately come to nutraceuticals production,

because biofuel production is not profitable yet.

Opportunities for entrepreneurs

- Combination of different businesses: ―What is interesting with microalgae

is that you can combine several forms of business together. For example

you combine biofuel business with nutraceutical business. Then there is a

possibility of making money.‖

- Renewable sources of energy can be used to make microalgae biomass:

―You can combine three forms of renewable energies together: tidal energy

for creating conditions in the photobioreactor bags, wind energy to make

windmills to power the production in electricity and solar energy to make

microalgae capture the sunlight and assimilate carbon dioxide and produce

Oxigen and biomass‖.

Issues regarding regulations for

microalgae food industry

In India, it is not forbidden to use waste water or power plants‘ flue gas to

provide nutrients to microalgae for human food. But the interviewee is

recommending using pure carbon and fresh water to make pure microalgae

with a high percentage of health beneficial compounds.

112


Interview 5 – Kyle

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Kyle

(22min) USA

Research

for

academia

Mechanical

engineer +5 years

The interviewee is working at designing processes

to extract oil from microalgae.

Topic Idea

Background

Since his undergraduate, the interviewee has been conducting several

studies in the field of microalgae. Most of his research has to do with

extracting oil to produce fuel with microalgae, in particular the mechanical

processes.

The interviewee is passionate about using the nature to produce technology.


working on

The interviewee is working on a project in collaboration with chemical

engineers. This project aims at optimizing the process of oil extraction to

make different by-products.


To grow algae, ―I have been using photobioreactors but I think there is a lot

of potential in open ponds.‖ The interviewee recommends the use of

photobioreactors for research purposes and the use of open ponds for

agricultural purposes. ―Photobioreactors are more adapted for laboratory

scale production and open ponds are more adapted for large scale

production.‖

Productivity

Microalgae biomass has a high yield per surface unit: ―I can‘t give you

exact numbers but you can in theory grow millions of tons of algae with the

same footprint that you grow a few acres of corn‖

Sources of funding

Corporations are the main sources of funding according to the interviewee,

thanks to carbon taxes: ―So, where do you get money from huh? I think

money is gonna come from corporations and specifically oil refineries,

heating plants, things like that. I don‘t know how it is in the UK but in the

United States we have the carbon taxes. Corporations try to reduce their

carbon emissions or they have to pay that tax. Some are already using

microalgae to reduce their carbon emissions‖.

Customers for microalgae by-

products/opportunities for entrepreneurs

Using microalgae to capture carbon from industrial flue gases and using

biomass to make biofuels. Then these ―biofuels can be sold back to the

grid‖. And what is left of biomass ―can be used in cosmetics and all the

kind of things that make you look pretty‖.

- The interviewee speaks about choosing at least one of these two paths to

be profitable with an algae-based business: using microalgae to recycle

waste water and using algae for biofuel production.

- ―If I had to start my company, I think I would develop some kind of

photobioreactors that companies who care about their carbon emissions

would just have to add to their infrastructure.‖

Potential of microalgae to mitigate

carbon emissions.

The interviewee thinks microalgae have the potential to play a role in

carbon mitigation: ―I think they should play a role and I think they will play

a role if people start thinking how they could reduce their carbon footprint

and how to reduce their carbon emissions.‖

The interviewee thinks that even if microalgae are not grown for their

biomass, they will play a role in carbon capture from industrial flue gases:

―I think microalgae will play a role as a filter‖ for carbon dioxide.

Microalgae-based biofuels The interviewee thinks it will take time to switch from fossil fuel to

113


biofuel: ―We can‘t get away of fossil fuels, at least not in my lifetime.‖

The interviewee speaks of the U.S. Military using microalgae to make fuel

for their ―Great Green Fleet‖. The interviewee believes that for lots of

innovation, ―the military develops it first and use it and then civilians start

to use it.‖ The interviewee thinks that it is what is going to happen with

microalgae biofuel.

The interviewee thinks using microalgae-based biofuels to replace fossil

fuel will start a ―sustainable cycle‖. ―Burning the biofuel produces less

CO2.‖

Opportunities and challenges for the

development of microalgae

- Politics: the interviewee thinks that one factor that keeps microalgae

technologies to develop is the lobbies and the pressure from oil industry.

―Renewable energies have been around since fossil fuel was discovered.

We‘ve been using windmills for centuries and technologies like this have

always been there but there is always been some kind of lag behind because

of big oil companies and stuff like that.‖ ―The main driver [for microalgae

based technologies to mitigate carbon emissions] will be the carbon taxes‖.

-Economically: the interviewee thinks that microalgae technologies may

not be developed enough yet to be profitable enough: ―the thing is, it has to

bring money. We have to reduce our factories costs and that is how people

will start to get into algae.‖

114


Interview 6 – Raphaël

This interview was carried out in French, so quotations are actually translated from French.

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Raphaël

(42min) France

Research

for

Business

Researcher

and manager

of the

research

team

+20

years

Doctor in chemistry specialized in use of agro-

resources to make by-products. Currently working

for a major company for algae as the manager of

the entire service of algal biomass.

Topic Idea

Background

The interviewee is a working in a leading algae company in France. He is

the director of the biomass-―valorisation‖ department, which means that he

is responsible for the ―development of algae by-products, from algae as

food to biofuel to cosmetics to materials‖.


working on

The interviewee is working in an environment in which use of microalgal

biomass to make by-products is being investigated. The range of products

developed by the department is wide: food, biofuel, cosmetics, chemical

compounds like carotene and Omega-3.

The company for which the interviewee is working is actually selling

research and innovation. It is not a company which produces microalgae

and sell biomass or by-products.


Depending on the demand for the research, different production technics

are being used:

- photobioreactors are often used for production of purer strain, with less

risk of contamination

- Open ponds are cheaper to operate but are not necessarily more profitable

than photobioreactors. Open ponds are more adapted to strains that are

highly resistant to contamination or that can grow in very adverse

conditions

Regulations in France regarding the use

of waste water or flue gases to bring

nutrients to microalgae

In France, there are regulations for microalgae food industry: you cannot

use waste water to produce microalgae for food, and ―flue gases must be

cleaned of compounds like Sulphurs and other oxides‖ before being

injected in microalgae farms. These regulations do not concern microalgae

production for biofuel however.

Drivers for microalgae-technologies

development

- Acceptation by people is necessary

- Carbon taxes. ―Politics and funding will play a major role in the

development of microalgae businesses to mitigate carbon emissions‖

- Research in genetics: ―There is lots of potential in genetically-modified

microalgae. It is already being developed in particular in the USA, and it

leads to high yielding.‖

Challenges for the development of

microalgae-based technologies

- Genetically-modified microalgae are being developed. However ―this is

still controversial as modified microalgae can be a risk for the environment

if they escape. They can contaminate an environment and alter the

biosphere, while being difficult to exterminate because they are

programmed to be stronger than natural algae‖.

Production costs Depending on the environment, production costs are between €3 and €6 per

kg in Europe and between 1 and 2€/kg in sunnier zones. Prospects are to go

115


under 1€/kg.

Microalgae to produce biofuel

The interviewee explains his opinion regarding the development of

microalgae biofuel in the future:

―Microalgae-based biofuel will not be something in the nearer future. But

depending on the evolution of the price of petroleum, it may change.‖

―There is a high potential for jet fuel and boat fuel however. Microalgae-

biofuels are already being produced for these applications‖

Microalgae to capture carbon dioxide

from flue gas

―I think it will be economically viable in the future to use microalgae for

carbon capture from flue gases. The brakes today are still the operating

costs. Growing microalgae ONLY to capture carbon dioxide will never be

profitable. But you can make use of biomass for by-products production.‖

Opportunities for entrepreneurs: the

most profitable by-products today

- ―Among high profit margin products that you can make with microalgae,

there are carotenoid, Omega-3, nutraceuticals. There is still some place in

this market for new companies, but it is not infinitely expansible‖. ‖You

can combine this market with producing animal food or fertilizers, with

what is left of biomass in the process of extracting the compounds you are

looking for.‖

- ―Heterotrophic growth of microalgae is being more and more used. It

leads to high yielding but its impact on the environment is not as good. In

heterotrophic growth, carbon comes from sugar and not only algae do not

capture carbon from the atmosphere, but they require surfaces of land to

grow sugarcane for their production.‖ ―Heterotrophic growth can reach

30% of dry biomass in one batch, against approximately 1% for autotrophic

growth‖.

116


Interview 7 - Barrack

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Barrack

(39min) USA

Research

for industry

Graduate

research

assistant

+5 years

Currently working at optimizing the air-to-liquid

CO2 mass transfer rate for microalgae cultivation

and finishing his PhD

Topic Idea

Background The interviewee has a mechanical engineering background and got into

microalgae research during his Master.

Project on which the interviewee is

working on

The interviewee is working on a project whose aim is to take CO2 out of the

surrounding environment to provide carbon to microalgae, instead of just

bubbling with a sparging system like most of the systems work. To do that,

the interviewee uses a specially designed wheel that maximizes the surface

contact between the air and the liquid containing microalgae.

This system can be adapted to capture carbon dioxide from flue gases.

Advantages of the system being

developed by the interviewee over

classic systems

The advantages of this system are that less energy is required to provide

CO2 to microalgae than for air-bubbling technologies, which use nozzles to

inject small bubbles. The system developed by the interviewee is only

using air and a wheel to maximize surface contact between the air and the

liquid containing microalgae and dissolve carbon dioxide in water

Moreover, with sparging systems, because bubbles go in water but then are

released into the atmosphere, ―you can lose between 10 and 90% of your

CO2‖. For the system developed by the interviewee, 90% of carbon dioxide

present in the environment will be captured by the liquid.

Capital costs for classic sparging systems with nozzles are cheap but

expensive to operate. Because you have to buy CO2 and inject it at high

energy costs. With the system of the interviewee, it is the contrary: capital

costs are higher, but operation costs are cheap, as CO2 is free and not much

energy is required to rotate the wheel (costs of electricity to operate the

system would represent only 2% of the operating costs of the whole

microfarm).

Applications for carbon capture from

flue gas

The system has been tried for carbon capture from flue gas with a strain of

microalgae tolerant to high temperatures (Chroogloecystis siderophila).The

interviewee reports that the system is efficient at dissolving carbon dioxide

from flue gas into microalgae liquid.


The interviewee answers a question regarding his opinion on the

technological options to grow microalgae: ―Open systems –ponds,

raceways, are much more cost-effective. At least in terms of making fuel. It

really depends on your end product. If you are trying to make fuel you are

definitely going to look at open ponds and raceways. But if you are trying

to make high-value products, it is also very clear that closed systems like

tubular photobioreactors is much better.‖

Potential for microalgae used to

sequestrate carbon dioxide from flue

gases

The interviewee is quite cautious with algae-based biosequestration:

―In terms of biological sequestration of CO2, I would say that algae have

some potential, but it is gonna really have to prove itself.‖

―I don‘t know how it is in the UK, but we have a lot of large-scale power

plants here. With output power like 360 MW. Massive plants. You will

never ever sequestrate CO2 from a super-massive power plant of 360 MW

with algae. You just can‘t. It requires way too much land. Thousands of

117


hectares of land. And this land probably has to be directly adjacent to the

power plant, or you probably will have to pay the costs to transport CO2

over. And then you gonna have distribution problems. How do you

distribute all this CO2 to your different farms?‖

―Personally I do not see CO2 sequestration ever happening for a large

system like that.‖

―However I think it does have potential for small distributed systems. 2 or 3

MW or less. And microalgae biomass will have to provide some valuable

products to pay for this system.‖

Driver for the development of

microalgae solutions to sequestrate

carbon and be profitable

―Research needs to go into how to grow algae faster. It needs to go into

research genetics, things like that. Algae are close to 50% carbon by mass.

And this carbon comes from CO2 so it sounds a little weird but the faster

you grow it, the more CO2 you will capture.

Potential of microalgae-based biofuel as

an alternative for fossil fuel

―I personally think algae fuel do have the potential to replace fossil fuel.

The question is whether or not another technology is gonna prove itself

first. There is a lot of R&D going on towards electric vehicles.‖

―Fuel costs, more than likely, based on past trends, are gonna continue to

increase. It is a matter of just when fuel costs are increased enough to meet

the decreasing costs of algae-oil. I don‘t think it is gonna happen now, but

maybe in 20, 30 years.‖

―The killer could be electrical vehicles. It is gonna either be a fuel

alternative or an electrical alternative. The thing is, with fuel, we already

have the infrastructure, gas stations everywhere.‖

Business opportunities in the field of

microalgae

If the interviewee were to set up his company in the field of microalgae to

mitigate carbon emissions, here is what he would do:

―Currently I don‘t think there is a lot of funding available. You will have to

start with a small company and look for one of these 1-2-3 MW facilities.

The smaller facilities that are generating heat or power. And try to prove

your technology there. If you can demonstrate at that scale that you can

totally or partially sequestrate the CO2 in the flue gases, then you are going

to create lots of credibility. I think there is a lot of potential there. Then you

can make and sell high value products like nutraceuticals. I think some of

these nutraceuticals can sell for more than $10,000 a pound, which is quite

a bit.‖

―You know you design your facility. In the short term you sell these high

value products to try to shortcut all your capital costs and then when you

start generating revenues either extend there or look for another site or

anything.‖

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Interview 8 – Ryan

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Ryan

(question-

aire)

South

Africa Business

Consultant,

chemist and

entrepreneur

+30

years

The interviewee has a background in chemistry

and is working as a consultant in renewable

energy and as an entrepreneur who grows

microalgae to make biogas in South Africa

Topic Idea

Background

―I am a chemical engineer with 30 years experience, 18 of which as a

design engineer. I have no biological knowledge of algae. Consequently,

my project approached algae from a strictly chemical engineering

perspective using techniques to sideline potential impacts of varying algae

strains on the outcome of my project. I decided on growing and processing

algae as a means of maximizing biomass growth relative to surface area.‖


working on

―I built a pilot algae to ethanol plant with a 20m2 open raceway circulated

by an electrically driven mechanical paddle. Harvested algae was

dewatered using various techniques of which a 5 micron diesel filter bag

proved the best method. Algae cake was acidified with sulphuric acid to

pH's between 1 and 2. The acidified algae was heated up to approximately

135oC in a pressure vessel with residence times between 5 and 20 minutes.

The cooked material was neutralised with caustic soda and pitched into a

fermenter. Yeast was added and the fermentation carried out over 48 hours

at approximately 25oC. The fermented material was distilled in a batch

fermenter and distillate collected from 70oC to 85

oC. Ethanol production of

about 50ml/m2/day was achieved during summer. During winter production

fell to <1/40th

of summer production due to sub zero night time

temperatures. The project was discontinued after a year of operation‖

Favourite technology to produce algae

and to harvest ―Open raceway and agitated filtration‖

Species grown for the needs of the

project

―Wild algae as found on our farm. Algae slurry was kept at 2gpl with a

production rate as high as 150 g/m2/day.

Wild algae is allowed to compete with other wild algae with the most

productive species dominating. During the change from summer to winter,

the species changed as the water temperature slowly dropped. Algae was

still growing in water just above freezing in outside temperatures of -7oC,

peak low of -15oC. Due to the metabolism, wild algae tend to produce

carbohydrate instead of lipid. As the downstream processing hydrolyses

carbohydrate to sugars, this characteristic is desirable.‖

Profitability of the project and customers

―Results indicated an income of Eu 0.025/m2/day with a profit margin of

20%.‖

Customers are ―Ethanol to oil companies at a selling price of approximately

Eu 0.50/litre‖

Funding of the project ―Self-funded‖

Question: ―Do you think algae will play

a role in carbon mitigation and which

algae-based technologies look to be the

most feasible economically speaking?‖

―Yes. We are looking at very large scale anaerobic digestion that will

produce a biogas with roughly 70% methane and 30% CO2. The intent is to

pump the CO2 into algae raceways and to recycle the algae back to

digestion. This means that the project will have a double bite at the CO2‖

Opportunities for the development of

algae-based technologies to mitigate

―Technologies and markets exist for consuming the resultant algae either

back into methane or into animal feed. There is a growing requirement by

119


carbon emissions governments to introduce carbon taxes. Algae is very well positioned to

recover/reduce CO2 emissions. The mechanism would be via an offset with

a company(ies) that are major CO2 emitters - power generation, cement,

steel, etc‖

Main barriers for the development of

algae-based technologies to mitigate

carbon emissions

―The major requirement is a large source of good quality CO2. The problem

with utility stack gas is the trace element impurities that come with the gas.

These have to be limited otherwise they will build up in the algae

production systems.‖

―Water is very important if an open system is to be used.‖

―I believe that algae as a stand alone will be difficult to be profitable except

for specialist, high value products. If it is included as part of an integrated

system, it will add major value to biogas projects.‖

Most viable algae-based solution to

mitigate carbon emissions, in the

opinion of the respondent

―Conversion of waste CO2 streams into algae. Depending on the CO2

source, methane is a good product especially for power utilities as they can

inject this into their processes. If the CO2 is good quality, then animal feed

and human based products can be produced that will have a higher value.

Personally, I am not sure that the capex/opex relationship will support

liquid fuel production. Instead, we are offering compressed/liquefied

methane as a diesel substitute rather than trying to convert algae oil or algae

to a liquid fuel.‖

Potential of algae-based biofuel. ―Do

you think algae could be used to capture

carbon in the atmosphere, and then be

turned into biofuel which would be burnt

and release carbon into the atmosphere,

thus creating a sustainable cycle?‖

―Very much so. Pakistan runs 85% of its cars on compressed natural gas

(CNG). There is no reason why this cannot be replaced with compressed

biomethane. We are about to start with a biomass to biogas project that will

supply the equivalent of 100 million litres of diesel per year as CBG. We

intend putting the CO2 from the biogas into algae production with the algae

being recycled back to digestion.‖

Drivers for the growth of microalgae-

based technologies to mitigate carbon

emissions

―Biomass to biogas that is compressed and used as fuel substitute is more

cost effective than liquid fossil fuels. Simple economics is driving the

conversion of taxis in South Africa to CNG which will be converted to

CBG over time. CBG sells for about $9/GJ which competes very well with

CNG at $12/GJ.

Carbon tax will encourage companies such as mines to grow their own

biomass for use as fuel thereby reducing their carbon footprint. This will

reduce actual cost while also reducing carbon tax.‖

Opportunities for entrepreneurs

―Production of algae using a CO2 source. Type of production will depend

on location, water, etc. Opportunities exist in low cost, big volume CO2

mitigation with options to convert the algae either to gas or to liquid fuel

with animal feed/human consumption products a potential for those who

understand algae intimately.‖

―If you are not a microbiologist and understand algae and their convoluted

lives, then growing wild algae has a lower risk. Wild algae is a very good

feed to anaerobic digestion operating at 15% dry solids percent. You use a

cross flow membrane to easily concentrate the algae from 2gpl to 15%

without any major problem.

If you are a microbiologist, I would look at nutraceuticals and animal

food.‖

120


Interview 9 - Paulo

Name

(duration

of

interview)


ence Details

Paulo Spain

and USA

Research

for

academia

and

business

Researcher

and serial

entrepreneur

+20

years

The interviewee teaches in two universities (one

in Spain and on in the USA). He successfully

created three start-ups and does mentorship for

other start-ups, whose activity is linked to

renewable energy and/or carbon capture. One of

the projects on which the interviewee worked on

was carbon capture with microalgae from flue gas

to produce biofuel.

Topic Idea

Background

The interviewee is dividing his time between two universities in the United

States and in Spain where he works as a researcher and a teacher in

renewable marine energies. He is the representative of several national and

international industry organizations and set up three.


working on

One of the projects on which the interviewee has been working on is a

US$0.9M project to capture carbon dioxide from flue gas with microalgae

grown in photobioreactors, and using the biomass to produce biofuel. It

was a one-year and a half project and conclusions were drawn on the

economic viability of using microalgae to capture carbon dioxide from flue

gas to produce biofuel, and its cost-effectiveness.

Technologies to grow microalgae photobioreactors

Microalgae used to capture CO2 from

flue gases

―Our first idea for the carbon capture project was to use microalgae,

because microalgae are clean and capture carbon dioxide with

photosynthesis‖.

Viability of using microalgae to capture

carbon dioxide from flue gases

The interviewee worked on several CCS projects, and he compares the

viability of using classic CCS with microalgae. He says, about carbon

capture with microalgae: ―I have to admit, it is not the most reliable option

for carbon capture‖.

―It will still take time to develop this technology. And money‖.

―[This is not viable today], even with carbon taxes and governmental

funding. At least in the US. However in Australia, they have the highest

carbon taxes in the world and they are planning to build a large-scale

microalgae farm for carbon capture‖.

Viability of using microalgae to capture

carbon dioxide from other sources

―I think microalgae will be used in the future to mitigate carbon emissions,

but it will require time and development.‖

Microalgae have the potential of capturing CO2 from the atmosphere and

reducing the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere at their scale: ―Flue

gases will not necessary have to play a role. Depending on the environment

and on the technics you use, you can capture between 100 and 500 tons of

CO2 from the atmosphere per hectare per year with microalgae‖.

How could carbon capture with

microalgae become more

profitable/business opportunities

―Today, producing biofuel with microalgae combined with carbon capture

only for that target is not cost-effective. It is not profitable. So for me, you

need to have a mix of productions to dedicate the growth of microalgae for

different applications such as nutraceuticals, food or feed for agriculture or

other products. Not only to produce biofuel.‖

Potential for biofuel in the future The interviewee does not think biofuel will be economically viable in the

near future. ―Not in the short term, I think it will take time to have

121


improvements in technology and knowledge. I think that it is not cost-

effective right now.‖

Business opportunities identified by the

interviewee

―Business opportunities with microalgae are not in carbon capture from

flue gases. Even though one of the biggest costs is in the nutrients needed

by microalgae to grow. You have to combine carbon capture with

applications. Microalgae have to be used to make not only biofuel, but

other products too.‖

―Other applications for microalgae is to produce for nutraceuticals. But

then you have be careful with the use of flue gas to produce microalgae for

food, because they can contain toxic compounds.‖

―One other opportunity is the development of technologies, R&D. If

microalgae businesses are going to develop, patents will sell for a high

price‖.

dissertaton benoît robart - msc. environmental entrepreneurship

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