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Neil · Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2008 6:56 pm Post subject:

Algae can double their size in a few hours; they can be grown in seawater in fact doing so using deep equatorial water which is heavy in nutrients is one of the earliest ideas. http://a-place-to-stand.blogspot....008/03/petrol-from-sea-water.html ; 405 square miles is a circle of radius 11 miles - wouldn't cover Islay & Jura, wouldn't come close to covering London.

Almost forgot - algae from seawater is CO2 negative if anybody is still taking the theory that we are suffering catastrophic warming seriously.

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The aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
H. L. Mencken

William_Cleland · Posted: Mon Oct 27, 2008 1:25 am Post subject:

Algae is not proven technology at this stage so that is just wild speculation. As Holebender points out there are limits with the other biofuel technologies, which are much further along in development terms, imposed by the need to feed a still growing world population and those are the ones that are credible options at this point after peak oil production. If I have hope for the future it is more based on the recent research of Daniel Nocera at MIT on artificial photosynthesis and on nuclear fusion than anything that is happening with algae:-

http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/21155/?a=f

http://www.iter.org/a/index_nav_1.htm

Neil · Posted: Mon Oct 27, 2008 10:46 am Post subject:

Both of which are also experimental & thus speculative as well (as the photo of Daniel producing the stuff in a laboratory beaker rather than a massive factory shows.

Where algae scores is that the energy efficiency with which algae creates combustible material & the low intrinsic cost of letting stuff grow is a matter of measurement. As a concept it is considerably less specualtive than "wildly" speculating in 1990 that some day it would be possible to produce a mobile phone smaller than a house brick.

In any case you are merely showing that there is not merely 1 or 2 ways of avoiding the promised crash but many. Crying doom in the Luddite cause is none of them.
_________________
The aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
H. L. Mencken

William_Cleland · Posted: Mon Oct 27, 2008 12:49 pm Post subject:

When they get the separation problem I mentioned earlier in the thread sorted out I'll take oil from algae seriously. Nocera's research represents that kind of breakthrough as did the tokamak design with nuclear fusion. That's why I think there is currently more chance of those actually working at a commercial scale down the road. In terms of discussing what will address peak oil it is best to stick to proven technology rather than extrapolating future progress in scientific research and engineering design, however.