WJ Editorial
The Waterways Journal
18 June 2007
The United States is the land of plenty. It is also a land of many surprises.
It was not a surprise to learn that making ethanol from corn would bring out thousands of lobbyists to push for programs to enhance the value of corn across our land. Prices were awful. So the great push was on, and news pages were (and still arc) filled with the wonderment of it all. In the Midwest, it seems there are more ethanol plants than sheep.
It was not a surprise that once the program got underway, critics would say that making ethanol requires more energy than it produces.
It was somewhat surprising in recent weeks to learn of the water requirement for ethanol producers and how it depletes water supplies. We are having serious water problems across the land now.
Perhaps we missed it along the way, but it was surprising to learn that the water discharged from ethanol is polluted. We also learned that growing more corn would require humongous amounts of additional fertilizer, which ultimately runs off into our streams and lakes, and produces algae that kills fish by robbing the water of oxygen. This algae ultimately flows to the Gulf of Mexico, where it has produced a dead zone in the Gulf of more than 7,000 square miles. Government studies have indicated the greatest polluter of our waterways is agricultural runoff.
But surprise, surprise! Now that ethanol plants are being constructed everywhere, now that the corn seed is in, now that investors have plunked billions into present and future ethanol plants that hunger for corn, we learn that oil can be produced from algae. We don't need corn, sugar and switchgrass, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.
David Summers, a mining engineer at the University of Missouri-Rolla, says that "...the energy crisis could be solved by an overlooked source: green, slimy algae — slick and buoyant because of its high oil content," as the Post put it. he wants to grow it in the university's experimental mine.
According to Summers, oil can be produced in Plexiglas tubes filled with several strains of algae. Growth lights shine on the tubes, and water, carbon dioxide and nutrients percolate up. The slime, research has shown, is one of the fastest-growing photo-synthesizers on earth. (How much energy' does it take to operate the growth lights?)
Surprise, surprise! Most algae are 20–25 percent oil. When stressed, some algae have achieved 50 percent oil. The Post report tells us that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has funded work with algae for nearly 20 years.
A 1998 summary report of a project indicated that the peak production in test ponds (if sustained for a year) would be the equivalent to more than 10,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre. Now comes enlightenment. According to the Post, corn produces about 400 gallons of ethanol per acre. There's a catch to producing oil from algae, of course. Isn't there always? The problems are evaporation during the day, cold temperatures at night, and the invasion of other less-useful algae species into the growing ponds. Summers believes that growing algae in the underground controlled environment will avoid those problems.
Because oil prices are running so high, venture capital is drifting toward algae, the Post article said. Virtually all of the operations are above ground. Summers says he is the only one talking about producing algae underground. He called himself "crazy" for suggesting it. (How many mines would it take to produce the U.S. daily requirement of oil?)
Another surprise: Purdue University researchers experimented with growing corn under tightly controlled conditions in an abandoned limestone mine. They were able to grow 337 bushels per acre, more than twice the average yield for the United States at the time. Well, that's a nice surprise, but where, we might ask, could we fund enough abandoned limestone mines to meet our corn-production needs?
Growing algae in Plexiglas tubes seems far less costly to us. It sounds like these little particles of life are born for the job. On the other hand, the farm lobby and sympathy for the farmers is strong, and we do have to make use of alternative fuels. Ethanol from corn just caught on. Not only do farmers earn more per bushel of corn, they have a place to invest their extra money. By the way, in Brazil, they make ethanol from sugarcane, which makes 600 gallons of product per acre compared with 400 for corn in the United States.
Ethanol production from corn will not go away. However, of late we have written about the soaring problems that exist in states that suddenly become corn importers and must alter their transportation systems drastically to accommodate it. But the game will play out, and more surprises will no doubt surface. Besides, growing corn large-scale in limestone mines hardly seems practical. It will be interesting to learn how practical growing algae in Plexiglass tubes is — large-scale.
If we can (tongue in cheek, of course), let us suggest another alternative. Why not turn aged barges into algae ponds? Barge covers are already available. When the oil bubbles up, they could just skim it off into a working barge, put the barge in tow and deliver it.
More stable minds, however, realize that it's going to take a variety of alternative methods of producing energy to meet our needs. As the situation grows more critical, as prices rise, those alternatives become more practical.