Biofuels made from algae are gaining attention as a domestic source of renewable fuel. However, with current technologies, scaling up production of algal biofuels to meet even 5 percent of U.S. transportation fuel needs could create unsustainable demands for energy, water, and nutrient resources. Continued research and development could yield innovations to address these challenges, but determining if algal biofuel is a viable fuel alternative will involve comparing the environmental, economic and social impacts of algal biofuel production and use to those associated with petroleum-based fuels and other fuel sources. Sustainable Development of Algal Biofuels was produced at the request of the U.S. Department of Energy.

Biofuels made from algae are gaining attention as a domestic source of renewable fuel. However, with current technologies, scaling up production of algal biofuels to meet even 5 percent of U.S. transportation fuel needs could create unsustainable demands for energy, water, and nutrient resources. Continued research and development could yield innovations to address these challenges, but determining if algal biofuel is a viable fuel alternative will involve comparing the environmental, economic and social impacts of algal biofuel production and use to those associated with petroleum-based fuels and other fuel sources. Sustainable Development of Algal Biofuels was produced at the request of the U.S. Department of Energy.

This edited volume focuses on comprehensive state-of-the-art information about the practical aspects of cultivation, harvesting, biomass processing and biofuel production from algae. Chapters cover topics such as synthetic ecological engineering approaches towards sustainable production of biofuel feedstock, and algal biofuel production processes using wastewater. Readers will also discover more about the role of biotechnological engineering in improving ecophysiology, biomass and lipid yields. Particular attention is given to opportunities of commercialization of algal biofuels that provides a realistic assessment of various techno-economical aspects of pilot scale algal biofuel production. The authors also explore the pre-treatment of biomass, catalytic conversion of algal lipids and hydrothermal liquefaction with the biorefinery approach in detail. In a nut shell, this volume will provide a wealth of information based on a realistic evaluation of contemporary developments in algal biofuel research with an emphasis on pilot scale studies. Researchers studying and working in the areas of environmental science, biotechnology, genetic engineering and biochemistry will find this work instructive and informative.

Socio-economic sustainability indicators that have been proposed previously for terrestrial bioenergy were evaluated for applicability to algal biofuels. Indicators developed for terrestrial bioenergy were found to be appropriate and sufficient for algae biofuels, meeting the selection criteria of practicality, wide applicability, predictability in response to management, anticipation of future changes, adaptability to multiple scales where possible, ability to integrate multiple dimensions, and non-redundancy. The 16 indicators fall into the categories of social well-being, energy security, external trade, profitability, resource conservation, and social acceptability. None of the indicators have yet been measured in published sustainability assessments for commercial facilities. Indicators estimated for various scenarios in the scientific literature include the profitability indicators return on investment and net present value, and the resource conservation indicator, fossil energy return on investment. The food security indicator, percent change in food price volatility, is easy to estimate at zero if agricultural lands are not used. Some indicators, such as the energy security indicators energy security premium and fuel price volatility and the external trade indicators terms of trade and trade volume cannot be projected into the future with accuracy, so they will not be measured prior to significant commercialization of algal biofuels. Furthermore, the list of proposed sustainability indicators may be adjusted to particular purposes and contexts. Together with environmental sustainability indicators, these socioeconomic sustainability indicators should contribute to sustainability assessments for algal biofuels.

The book is devoted to the current problem of global sustainable development; conflicts with the effective system working that allow making some conclusion for further compatibility improvements. At foremost, analyses look at recent international and own researchers dealing with algae technology and conversation to energy. The total global production of macroalgae is superior about 100 times compared to microalgae or 19 - 23 million tons by dry weight and market at $5 - 6 billion. Macroalgal biomass has a potential for the production of biofuels and can be used also for decentralized wastewater cleaning. The analyses showed that development microalgae producing have all necessary unlimited resources such as land and water (wastewater and groundwater). Food waste use for microalgae cultivation can lead to GHG mitigation up to 3.3 GTCO2e/yr or 8 % of global emissions. The UNEP ignored high carbon capture and storage (CCS) potential of algae. Simultaneously, international organization and researchers as main constraints for microalgae biofuels have described the cost of their production based on comparing with prices of oil fuels and crop biofuels. Comparison of the cost of microalgal biofuel production with a subsided prices of oil and crops biofuel is a methodical mistake as the governments have paid part of their fuel price from public funds as well as it is necessary to take into account also large scale production competitive benefits. It is stressed that many projects and Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) are based on using fertilizers for nutrition microalgae. According to the ISO/TS 14067, we estimated day input of including fertilizers with nitrogen content in the total emissions of the product full life cycle by expanding of LCA boundary. Calculation emission by the use of last U.S. NPEL design of microalgae to biofuel showed that only used fertilizers with nitrogen content for the day microalgae biomass production release CO2 emission 63.56 kgCO2e per kg of the produced microalgae biomass. This is more that impact of CCS by algae cultivation - 1.83 kgCO2e per kg of algal biomass, gasoline and diesel emissions by combustion in motor vehicles (gasoline is realized 2.29 kgCO2/L (E10 - 2.21 and E85 - 1.61 kgCO2/L ) and diesel - 2.66 kgCO2/L (B5 - 2.65 and B20 - 2.62 kgCO2/L)) as well as sum of crude oils extraction-to-refining (4 to 50 gCO2e/megajoule (MJ) (about half of the total EU plants has extraction-to-refining emission from 4 to 9 gCO2/MJ) and combustion in motor vehicle emissions of 73 gCO2e/MJ). This proves that phototrophic growth of microalgae has no perspective for commercial production. The additional stressed issue is that in 2016, biofuel crops boost fertilizer industry and nitrogen fertilizer consumption intended to biofuels production. Therefore, it offered that first generation biofuel producers should seriously think about the use of feedstock yields originated by the use of organic agriculture approach. As a result of system analyses, it made the conclusion that sole main barrier for realizing of algae biofuel potential is ineffective international and governmental policies which create difficulties in the coupling of the goals between economic development and environmental activity. Therefore, we offered the new design of environmental police and relevant innovative financial mechanisms in a framework of Public/Private Partnership for archiving of effective investment flow to mitigation pollution. This policy based on recognizing of Life Conserve industry as the separate branch of production and each company which activity direct or indirect decrease pollution must receive payment for the impact of their products. Simultaneously, the analysis provides that near-term microalgae come to big feed additives market as feed additives for animals and for the fishmeal replacement in aquaculture due to competitive cost archived by technological advancement and benefits of their content.

This book enables readers to understand the theoretical aspects, key steps and scientific techniques with a detailed mechanism to produce biofuels from algae. Each chapter provides the latest developments and recent advancements starting from algal cultivation techniques to the production of value-added green fuels, chemicals and products with wide applications. The volume brings together a broad range of international and interdisciplinary experts, including chemical and biological engineers, biotechnologists, process engineers, environmentalists, pharmacists and nutritionists, to one platform to explore the beneficial aspects and challenges for an algal-based biorefinery. Chapters address cutting-edge issues surrounding algal cultivation, including genetic modification of algal strains, design and optimization of photobioreactors and open-pond systems, algal oil extraction techniques and algal-derived fuel products (biodiesel, bio-gasoline, jet fuels and bio-oil). Finally, the book considers the potential environmental impacts for establishing a sustainable algal biorefinery through lifecycle analysis, techno-economic assessment and supply chain management. This book will be an important resource for students, academics and professionals interested in algal cultivation, biofuels and agricultural engineering, and renewable energy and sustainable development more broadly.

This dissertation is an ethnography of potentiation the labourious processes by which potential is imagined and materialized. It investigates how life scientists and engineers potentiate algae as alternative sustainable biofuels in the wake of the global food versus fuel debate of the late 2000s. I draw on two years of multi-sited ethnographic research conducted in the United States and Turkey to document why, how, and to what end do algal biofuel advocates figure algae as a material brimming with potential. I show that this potential is grounded in the reproductive capacities of algae as a life form, through its activation in environmental remediation projects, and through its compatibility with new biotechnologies and bioeconomic markets. At its heart, this dissertation troubles the notion of potentiality in two ways: it disrupts imaginaries of algaes potential as a natural, innate sustainable energy resource, while it simultaneously de-naturalizes ideas about the inherent potential of the United States as the hegemonic model of all bioeconomies. I begin with a historical overview of biofuels research in the United States and Turkey to demonstrate national differences in algal biofuel advocacy. While state and governmental initiatives profoundly shape algal biofuels research in the United States, the biofuels sector is actively sidelined by the Turkish state. As this dissertation demonstrates, Turkish scientists instead have sought to fill this science and energy policy vacuum by modeling algal biofuels inside their imaginaries of modernity. As such, this dissertation intends to provincialize American-centered accounts of bioeconomies. Further, it contributes to STS literature on bioeconomies by examining how biovalue is made within systems, as well as inside of the frameworks of systems biology and integrated systems of production. By drawing on fieldwork conducted inside laboratories, conferences, and critical textual analyses, I coin the analytic of built ecologies the infrastructures such as test tubes and photobioreactors to unpack how sustainable algal biofuels are made and remade inside of designed and engineered processes. Challenging these processes, this dissertation instead invites readers to explore alternate ways of engaging with algae and biofuels as a way to confront relentless reductions of life forms into energetic biomass.