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To: count-your-change
"But the math is: the city discharges 86 million gallons of waste/day and the gas generation uses about 1 million gallons/day. That’s less than 2%."

Sorry, but that's still not particularly impressive.

"CNG(mostly methane) can be used as a motor fuel and is. So far what algae oil has generated is extravagant claims and press releases. I’ve already posted many of them so I’ll not repeat them here."

The difference is that people have been trying to generate methane from "poop streams" for more than half a century (or longer), and nobody has succeeded in coming up with a practical way to do it economically. Algae oil, on the other hand, is VERY young, and very much in the R&D stage, but given that early stage, what has been accomplished thus far is pretty impressive (I do R&D for a living, so I have a passing familiarity with bringing new ideas to fruition). Given the possibilities of genetic engineering available today, I think the available "space for improvement" is a LOT higher for algae oil than it is for biomethane. I suspect eventually someone will come up with a bug that eats cellulose, and poops diesel directly,

96 posted on 08/10/2008 6:48:42 PM PDT by Wonder Warthog (The Hog of Steel-NRA)
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To: Wonder Warthog
Solazyme claims they've produced an oil that can be used as diesel fuel without any further modification. Whether their algae eats cellulose I don't know.
By the by, When I said 1% here I should’ve said !0%,
“ Valcent’s most optimistic projections it would cost $2.4 trillion to supply just 1% of U.S. transportation fuels..”
But as you say, “Sorry, but that's still not particularly impressive.”
Well, if I can't impress you and I can't convince you I'll just have to say good night and dream of algaecide.
98 posted on 08/10/2008 8:54:24 PM PDT by count-your-change (you don't have to be brilliant, not being stupid is enough.)
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