Critical Review of Microalgae LCA Studies for Bioenergy Production

Ketzer, Franziska; Skarka, Johannes; Rösch, Christine

doi:10.1007/s12155-017-9880-1

Cited by 69 publications

(34 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…The whole of the plant can thus be harvested, unlike land-based bioenergy crops, where roots and often stover from cereal crops must be left in place to maintain soil fertility and prevent soil erosion. Another benefit is that microalgal strains can be selected or engineered to produce either high concentrations of lipids or hydrogen [20].…”

Section: Microalgae For Fuelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

New Energy Technologies: Microalgae, Photolysis and Airborne Wind Turbines

Moriarty¹,

Honnery²

2019

Sci

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Because of the near-term risk of extreme weather events and other adverse consequences from climate change, and, at least in the longer term, global fossil fuel depletion, there is world-wide interest in shifting to noncarbon energy sources, especially renewable energy (RE). Because of possible limitations on conventional renewable energy sources, researchers have looked for ways of overcoming these shortcomings by introducing radically new energy technologies. The largest RE source today is bioenergy, while solar energy and wind energy are regarded as having the largest technical potential. This paper reviews the literature on proposed new technologies for each of these three RE sources: microalgae for bioenergy, photolysis and airborne wind turbines. The main finding is that their proponents have underestimated the difficulties facing their introduction on a very large scale.

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Section: Microalgae For Fuelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

New Energy Technologies: Microalgae, Photolysis and Airborne Wind Turbines

Moriarty¹,

Honnery²

2019

Sci

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“…The results of life cycle assessment (LCA) studies on microalgae cultivation, mainly performed for fuel production, differ widely. Depending on the data used and assumptions made, for example, on productivity, content of fatty acids, proteins and polysaccharides, and energy requirement, the energy return on investment (EROI) varies from 0.01 to 3.35 (Ketzer, Skarka, & Rösch, 2018;Weiss, 2016). The highest environmental impact on the global warming potential of algae cultivation in PBRs is related to the consumption of energy, especially electricity for mixing, temperature control, as well as-depending on the concept-lighting (Mok & Rösch, 2017;Smetana, Sandmann, Rohn, Pleissner, & Heinz, 2017).…”

Section: Environmental Aspectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microalgae for integrated food and fuel production

2018

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Microalgae have a great potential for the sustainable production of food and fuel for a growing world population with increasing demands and changing habits. Since they are cultivated in technical systems, they do not contribute to land use competition, loss of biodiversity, and environmental pollution like other food and energy crops. Despite these advantages, the commercialization of algae technology is still in an infant stage. Algae fuel production has so far failed due to low oil prices and lack of economic viability. However, integrated food and fuel production is considered promising because the food market is more diversified and open to new and innovative products than the energy market. Integrated food and fuel production from microalgae can not only achieve higher returns on investment but also greater acceptance than fuel production alone. From the sociotechnical point of view, it is however crucial that the integrated algae production system will fulfill the promises of health and sustainability. To achieve this, a codesign approach is used, considering public perception and the views, knowledge and values of citizens and stakeholders already at an early stage in the research and innovation process.

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“…Centrifugation and sedimentation may be costly for the production of biofuel and bioproducts. Table 6 shows the total primary energy input of harvesting and downstream steps to determine the energy efficiency of the process (Ketzer et al 2018). Allnutt and Kessler (2015) discussed the historical approaches and recent advances while comparing and contrasting the different methods with an engineering estimate of comparative costs.…”

Section: Harvestingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…EROI values for algal biofuels are generally lower than unity. Ketzer et al (2018) summarizes numerous existing studies of EROI for bioenergy production. Figure 3 demonstrates the energy inputs according to production steps.…”

Section: Life Cycle Assessment (Lca) Of Algae-to-energy Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Integration of biology, ecology and engineering for sustainable algal-based biofuel and bioproduct biorefinery

Allen

Unlu

Demi̇rel

et al. 2018

Bioresour. Bioprocess.

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Despite years of concerted research efforts, an industrial-scale technology has yet to emerge for production and conversion of algal biomass into biofuels and bioproducts. The objective of this review is to explore the ways of possible integration of biology, ecology and engineering for sustainable large algal cultivation and biofuel production systems. Beside the costs of nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorous, and fresh water, upstream technologies which are not ready for commercialization both impede economic feasibility and conflict with the ecological benefits in the sector. Focusing mainly on the engineering side of chemical conversion of algae to biodiesel has also become obstacle. However, to reduce the costs, one potential strategy has been progressing steadily to synergistically link algal aquaculture to the governmentally mandated reduction of nitrogen and phosphorous concentrations in municipal wastewater. Recent research also supports the suppositions of scalability and cost reduction. Noticeably, less is known of the economic impact of conversion of the whole algae-based biorefinery sector with additional biochemical and thermochemical processes and integration with ecological constraints. This review finds that a biorefinery approach with integrated biology, ecology, and engineering could lead to a feasible algal-based technology for variety of biofuels and bioproducts. which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

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Critical Review of Microalgae LCA Studies for Bioenergy Production

Cited by 69 publications

References 30 publications

New Energy Technologies: Microalgae, Photolysis and Airborne Wind Turbines

New Energy Technologies: Microalgae, Photolysis and Airborne Wind Turbines

Microalgae for integrated food and fuel production

Integration of biology, ecology and engineering for sustainable algal-based biofuel and bioproduct biorefinery

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