guardian.co.uk,
John Vidal, environment editor, Friday 13 January 2012
 |
| A Maersk container ship. The results of subsituting algal oil for bunker fuel are being evaluated by the shipping company. Photograph: Roland Magunia/AFP/Getty Images |
Giant cargo
boats and US navy warships have been successfully powered on oil derived from
genetically modified, microscopic algae in moves which could see a revolution
in the fuel used by the world's fleets and a reduction in the pollution they
cause.
The results
of substituting algal oil for low-grade, "bunker" fuel and diesel in
a 98,000-tonne container ship are still being evaluated by Maersk, the world's
biggest shipping company, who last week tested 30 tonnes of oil supplied by the
US navy in a vessel travelling from Europe to India. Last month the navy tested
20,000 gallons of algal fuel for a few hours on a decommissioned destroyer.
Both ran their trials on a mix of algal oil – between 7% and 100% – and
conventional bunker fuel.
"The
tests are not complete yet but we had very few problems," said a Maersk
spokesman.
Collaboration
between the world's two biggest shipping fleets is expected to lead to the
deployment of renewable marine fuels. Maersk uses more than $6bn of bunker fuel
a year for its 1,300 ships, and the US navy, the world's biggest single user of
marine fuels, burns around 40m barrels of oil a year. The navy plans to test
more ships on algal fuel next year as part of its "green fleet" initiative and has pledged to cut 50% of its conventional oil use a year by
2020 to reduce US imports. Maersk hopes to achieve similar cuts in the same
time.
"Shipping
takes 350m tonnes of oil a year and causes 3-4% of all greenhouse gas
emissions, so it is very attractive to find alternatives. We can envisage [the
world's] ships being 10% or more powered by biofuels in 20 years' time,"
said Jacob Sterling, Maersk head of climate and environment.
The exact
nature of the algae, one of 30,000 single-cell organisms known to exist in the
wild, is a closely guarded secret of Solazyme, the company which manufactures
the fuel in giant fermentation tanks in Pennsylvania. The fast-growing algae
are fed crop or forest waste and convert their sugars to oil.
"The
technology is there. The question now is how to scale up," said Tyler
Painterm, chief finance officer of Solazyme, which has a contract to produce
450,000 gallons of biofuels for the navy's trial. "We have tested
thousands of algae, found in swamps, in mountains and at sea and we know we can
be competitive. By using different strains of algae we can produce different
kinds of oils."
The
company, which is set to expand shortly with a 50m gallon-a-year plant in
Brazil, is backed by oil company Chevron, giant US agribusiness Bunge, and Sir
Richard Branson whose Virgin airline has tested planes on algal fuel.
Unlike
early biofuels, which made transport fuel from food crops, the new "second
generation" process uses only plant waste and does not displace foods
which could be fed to people or animals. Nevertheless, immense amounts of
feedstock would be needed to power the world's ships. Maersk estimates it could
take the crop waste of an area half the size of Denmark to completely power
their ships.
But even a
partial switch to algal oils would massively reduce air pollution. Bunker fuel,
which is little more than asphalt, can produce as much pollution from a single ship in a year as 50m cars, is the most polluting fuel in the world.
But there
is uncertainty over how much algal fuels would reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Algae sequester CO2 when growing, but they release it when burned as oil.
Solazyme and Maersk claim that they reduce carbon emissions by 80% compared
with petroleum derived fuels in a "lifetime" analysis.
The race is
on between different companies to produce competitive algal oils. In October
2010, the US Navy purchased 20,055 gallons on algae biofuel at $424 per gallon,
but by December 2011, the price had reduced to $26.67 per gallon. Meanwhile,
Craig Venter, the scientist who first sequenced the human genome and designed
the first synthetic cell, is trying to develop a genetically engineered algae fuel that depends only on sunlight and sea water and can be grown and harvested
at sea.
In an interview in this month's Scientific American, he said: "We need three
major ingredients: CO2, sunlight and seawater, aside from having the facility
and refinery to convert all those things. We're looking at sites around the
world that have the major ingredient. To us, this is a long-term plan."
If the US
navy does switch to algae or other biofuels, it would mark the end of an era of
oil-burning navies ushered in by Winston Churchill. In 1911, as British navy
minister, he controversially ordered the massive British fleet to switch from
coal to oil for efficiency.
Two years
later he bought for the UK government a 51% controlling interest in the then
small Anglo-Persian Oil Company. Within a few years, the company changed its
name to BP, and is now the world's fourth largest corporation.
• Get the
Guardian's environment news on your iPhone with our new app. You can also join
us on Twitter, Facebook and Google+
Related Articles:
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.