Joule Biotech - the perfect renewable fuel?

[bik0]

Joule grows the microbes in photobioreactors that need no fresh water and occupy only a fraction of the land needed for biomass-based approaches. The creatures secrete fuel continuously, so it's easy to collect. Lab tests and small trials lead Afeyan to estimate that the process will yield 100 times as much fuel per hectare as fermenting corn to produce ethanol, and 10 times as much as making it from sources such as agricultural waste. He says costs could be competitive with those of fossil fuels.

If Afeyan is right, biofuels could become an alternative to petroleum on a much broader scale than has ever seemed possible. The supply of conventional biofuels, such as those made from corn, is constrained by the vast amount of water and agricultural land needed to grow the plants they're made from. And while advanced biofuels require less water and don't need high-quality land, their potential is limited by the expensive, multistep processes needed to make them. As a result, the International Energy Agency estimates that in 2050, biodiesel and ethanol will meet only 26 percent of world demand for transportation fuel.

http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/25077/?nlid=2916&a=f

[kristopher]

1. From the article

"The supply of conventional biofuels, such as those made from corn, is constrained by the vast amount of water and agricultural land needed to grow the plants they're made from. And while advanced biofuels require less water and don't need high-quality land, their potential is limited by the expensive, multistep processes needed to make them..."

Expense and multistep processes are problems with next gen biofuels, and if this method simplifies the process that is really a good thing.

However, the fact is that when "the International Energy Agency estimates that in 2050, biodiesel and ethanol will meet only 26 percent of world demand for transportation fuel" it wasn't the complexity and lack of ability to reduce cost that caused them to arrive at that number.

The article glossed over what the actual primary constraint is with one sentence,"Biofuels ultimately come from carbon dioxide and water."

To be sustainable and productive a biofuel must have a source of concentrated CO2. The only concentrated sources of CO2 that we will have once we stop producing them from fossil fuels are the various biological waste streams we and our agricultural practices produce.

Harnessing those sources of CO2 are a large part of the "multistep processes" that the article attributes to other technologies; and since they haven't gone into how they will get around that, it seems reasonable to conclude that they suffer the same constraint.

So while their technology *might* provide a marginal improvement over other advanced biofuels in the way fuel is separated from the brewing mixture it is highly unlikely that it is going to substantially increase the role of liquid biofuels in a carbon constrained future.

[bananas]

2. It'll be interesting if they combine that approach with

this: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x243072

MIT Improves Efficiency With 3D Solar Panel Structures

Very interesting research on improving the efficiency of solar panels being produced at MIT:


The Massachusetts Institute of Tehcnology 's (MIT) answer to creating a high efficiency solar panel takes shape in the form of 3D, origami folding structures.

When someone says solar panel, we think flat, sleek-looking installations in open fields or on roof tops. The panels are intentionally flat to avoid "shadowing" (covered areas that would reduce efficiency).

MIT wants to expand this preconception, and its researchers have discovered that covering 3D structures with solar cells could dramatically improve efficiency. Better yet, they could do so while taking up a limited mount of space.

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