Algae-based biofuel production as part of an industrial cluster

Abstract

This paper presents study on the production of biofuels from algae cultivated in municipal wastewater in Gothenburg, Sweden. A possible biorefinery concept is studied based on two cases; Case A) combined biodiesel and biogas production, and Case B) only biogas production. The cases are compared in terms of product outputs and impact on global CO2 emissions mitigation. The area efficiency of the algae-based biofuels is also compared with other biofuel production routes. The study investigates the collaboration between an algae cultivation, biofuel production processes, a wastewater treatment plant and an industrial cluster for the purpose of utilizing material flows and industrial excess heat between the actors. This collaboration provides the opportunity to reduce the CO2 emissions from the process compared to a stand-alone operation. The results show that Case A is advantageous to Case B with respect to all studied factors. It is found that the algae-based biofuel production routes investigated in this study has higher area efficiency than other biofuel production routes. The amount of algae-based biofuel possible to produce corresponds to 31 MWfuel for Case A and 26 MWfuel in Case B.

Enzymatically and/or thermally treated Macroalgae biomass as feedstock for fermentative H2 production

“…Due to its high carbohydrate content, macroalgae biomass is a suitable carbohydrate source for biotechnological processes, like fermentative H 2 production [7,8]. Compared to higher plant biomass, algae offer a number of potential advantages: 1) they convert sunlight to biochemical energy more efficiently than terrestrial plants; 2) they grow on vast tracts of sea by action of sunlight only, without the need for fertilizers; 3) their production does not depend on arable land availability, so their cultivation does not compete with food production; 4) they consume CO 2 , thereby helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions; and 5) they do not contain lignin, which simplifies biomass saccharification processes for further use in fermentation [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16].…”

Optimization of Biodiesel Production from Spent Palm Cooking Oil Using Fractional Factorial Design Combined with the Response Surface Methodology

“…The feedstock costs constitute about 70-90% of the total biodiesel production cost (Connemann and Fischer, 1998). Thus Used Cooking Oil (UCO) or algae oil (Yaakob et al, 2013;Arjun et al, 2008;Knothe et al, 2009;Galadima and Muraza, 2014;Andersson et al, 2014;Nautiyal et al, 2014), which are cheap or free to use, can be employed as biodiesel feedstock to reduce the biodiesel production cost (Canaki, 2007). Huge amounts of UCOs are available throughout the world particularly in the developing countries such as the Kingdom of Bahrain.…”

Utilisation of Excess Heat Towards a Circular Economy: Implications of interorganisational collaborations and strategic planning

“…The production of algae has been shown to give effective production and environmental outcomes within the scope of industrial symbiosis synergies (Andersson et al, 2014). The return rate from the land used producing algae is five times higher than for other sources of biofuel (Andersson et al, 2014), and the cultivation provides four times more energy than what is needed as input (Karlsson-Ottosson, 2015).…”

“…The production of algae has been shown to give effective production and environmental outcomes within the scope of industrial symbiosis synergies (Andersson et al, 2014). The return rate from the land used producing algae is five times higher than for other sources of biofuel (Andersson et al, 2014), and the cultivation provides four times more energy than what is needed as input (Karlsson-Ottosson, 2015). In addition, heated excess water is beneficial since it contains nutrients that otherwise would have needed to be provided by additional artificial fertilisers to improve the growth (Andersson et al, 2014).…”

“…The return rate from the land used producing algae is five times higher than for other sources of biofuel (Andersson et al, 2014), and the cultivation provides four times more energy than what is needed as input (Karlsson-Ottosson, 2015). In addition, heated excess water is beneficial since it contains nutrients that otherwise would have needed to be provided by additional artificial fertilisers to improve the growth (Andersson et al, 2014). This results in a reduced need for conventional heated excess water (excess heat) treatments.…”