UK Seaweed Biofuel

(AP HORIZONS) - Rich in minerals and oils, algae has always been a top cuisine for all forms of life: from dinosaurs and fish to ancient societies around the world. But can this water weed be used to power our fuel-thirsty transport needs? (Oct 17, 2011)

Credits: Researched, field produced, edited video, wrote script

Featured in the Washington Post & USA Today

SHOTLIST

AP Television

Isle of Seil, Scotland – August 23, 2011

1. Mid of ecologist Lars Brunner pulling out seaweed from the river

2. Close of Brunner with large piece of seaweed in his hands

3. SOUNDBITE (English) Lars Brunner, BioMara Marine Ecologist:

“There’s a huge quantity of seaweed on the Scottish coasts. I think a very conservative estimate from back in the 1940s or 50s they estimated in the region of 12 million tonnes around the Scottish coasts. We don’t advocate large scale extraction of the wild product ourselves, what we’re interested in is actually trying to perfect cultivating it – taking some wild specimens to use the seed but then actually growing it on long line systems in a way you would use, for instance, to grow mussels.”

4. Wide of Brunner, looking in river for new seaweedspecimens

5. Mid of Brunner searching through the river

AP Television

Oban, Scotland – 22 August 2011

6. Wide of seaweed outside the European Centre for Marine Biotechnology, home of the BioMara project

7. Mid of sign reading: (English) “European Centre for Marine Biotechnology”

8. Wide of Dr. Michelle Stanley, head of BioMara project and lead marine biochemist, working in her lab

9. Close of Dr. Stanley taking bottle off shelf

10. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Michelle Stanley, Head of BioMara project and Marine Biochemist:

“BioMara is looking at the feasibility of producing bio-fuels from algae. And when we say algae, that’s both micro-algae, small, single celled organisms, right the way up to seaweeds. In terms of micro-algae, there’s interest in bio-diesel production and in terms of seaweed, we’re looking at bio-methane and bio-ethanol.”

AP Television

Oban, Scotland – 22 August 2011

11. Wide of BioMara aquarium where freshly collected algae is stored

12. Mid of bubbling preservation tanks

13. Close of bubbling preservation tank

14. Wide of Dr. John Day, head of the Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa at BioMara, looking through microscope

BIOMARA – Culture Collection of Algae

Non AP Television News material

15. STILL of algae under microscope – Chlorella salina

16. STILL of algae under microscope – Odontella mobiliensis

AP Television

Oban, Scotland – 22 August 2011

17. Close of Day looking into microscope

18. SOUNDBITE: (English) Dr. John Day, Head of the Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa at BioMara:

“If you look at terrestrial agriculture, terrestrial agriculture is some tens of thousands of years old. Growing micro-algae in vast amounts is literally, 30, 40, 50 years old – it depends on who you take as the first people who did it. So there’s a tremendous amount of process catch up, a tremendous amount of strain development – the sort of thing that’s been done in agriculture for generations. All of this work is being done now – much of it must be condensed. We also need to know the fundamental processes behind that. Before you can adapt or change or develop something, you have to know how it works.”

19. Wide of BioMara’s algae culture collection

20. Close of algae culture in a test tube

21. Various of algae culture in cylinder glasses

22. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Michelle Stanley, Head of BioMara project and lead marine biochemist:

“Once the material is harvested, it would then be a question of doing the fermentation on that to then produce the ethanol. And then the ethanol would have to be cleaned up.”

23. Wide of Stanley standing next to algae fermenting machine

24. Close of fermenting machine

25. Close of GC-FID machine, an algae fatty acids reader, which tells the amount of fuel that can be made from each plant

26. Mid of woman analysing algae under microscope

27. Close of woman analysing algae under microscope

AP Television

Glasgow, Scotland – August 24, 2011

28. Wide of Dr. Ian Watson, Lecturer in Systems, Power and Energy at the University of Glasgow, typing

29. Close of Dr. Watson typing

30. SOUNDBITE: (English) Dr. Ian Watson, Lecturer in Systems, Power and Energy at the University of Glasgow:

“Bio-diesel and bio-ethanol production – the production of those oils can fit into existing infrastructure which makes a lot of sense commercially and will eventually make these fuels more viable in the long term.”

AP Television

Isle of Seil, Scotland – 23 August 2011

31. Wide of car driving over a river with seaweed floating on the water surface.

LEAD IN:

Algae might be nothing more than an unsightly water weed in most people’s eyes, but a team of Scottish scientists have grand plans.

It’s hoped the mineral and oil rich algae growing around the remote Scottish town of Oban could provide diesel fuel for tractors.

STORYLINE

Rich in minerals and oils, algae has always been a top cuisine for all forms of life: from dinosaurs and fish to ancient societies around the world.

But can this water weed be used to power our fuel-thirsty transport needs?

The BioMara project, a group of marine biologists within the European Centre for Marine Biotechnology, are at the forefront of this research.

But before the science can begin it’s time to get wet and cold.

Lars Brunner, an ecologist for BioMara straps on the Wellington boots and spends each morning collecting different types of specimens from his hometown of the Isle of Seil, an island off the west coast of Scotland.

“There’s a huge quantity of seaweed on the Scottish coasts. I think a very conservative estimate from back in the 1940s or 50s they estimated in the region of 12 million tonnes around the Scottish coasts. We don’t advocate large-scale extraction of the wild product ourselves. What we’re interested in is actually trying to perfect cultivating it – taking some wild specimens to use the seed but then actually growing it on long line systems in a way you would use, for instance, to grow mussels,” says Brunner.

He also stresses that the benefit of self-cultivating algae for fuel is that Scotland would be spared from over-industrialisation and landlocked countries around the world will be able to benefit too.

Once he’s collected enough good samples he will transport them back here to the BioMara labs.

This entire project began when Dr. Michelle Stanley, a marine biochemist from the remote town of Oban, noticed farmers in distant villages were struggling to afford diesel for their tractors.

She knew the work in marine-based energy needed more research and would be the future of bio-fuels.

She explains: “BioMara is looking at the feasibility of producing biofuels from algae. And when we say algae, that’s both micro-algae- small, single celled organisms right the way up to seaweeds. In terms of micro-algae, there’s interest in bio-diesel production and in terms ofseaweed, we’re looking at bio-methane and bio-ethanol.”

But where to begin in revolutionising the world’s fuel requirements from crude oil to crude algae?

BioMara says the first step is figuring out which seaweedsare the best at producing large quantities of fuel the quickest – that is, which ones grow the biggest with the most fatty oils.

Once new specimens have been collected, Brunner brings them back to the lab’s aquarium rooms and temporarily preserves them.

“Each specimen needs different conditions to survive, so this is like a big animal shelter for algae,” says Dr. John Day, the head of Culture Collection

The algae are given to Dr Day, who identifies the species and records their molecular make-up. He also investigates ways to improve to make algae more commercially viable and scaleable.

Dr. Day says: “If you look at terrestrial agriculture, terrestrial agriculture is some tens of thousands of years old. Growing micro-algae in vast amounts is literally, 30, 40, 50 years old – it depends on who you take as the first people who did it. So there’s a tremendous amount of process catch up, a tremendous amount of strain development – the sort of thing that’s been done in agriculture for generations. All of this work is being done now – much of it must be condensed. We also need to know the fundamental processes behind that. Before you can adapt or change or develop something, you have to know how it works.”

Once each collected specimen has been identified and deconstructed, Day archives them in the largest living library of algae in Europe. The seeds from the archives are then used in an internal harvest.

Stanley is in charge of decomposing the algae into the fuel energy. “Once the material is harvested, it would then be a question of doing the fermentation on that to then produce the ethanol. And then the ethanol would have to be cleaned up,” she says.

BioMara experiments with seaweed fuels through two processes: fermenting and anaerobic digestion. The process of fermenting combines yeast with algae to create ethanol – a process similar to making beer. In anaerobic digestion, scientists add various bacteria to algae to eventually create methane.

To measure the amount of ingredients needed for each experiment, scientists use a GC-FID machine.

This device separates the fatty acid from the plant then records the acid readings for later comparisons. Fatty acids are the primary component of algae to create energy. Therefore, the reader helps lab workers know how much fuel can be made from a certain amount of plant species.

Ian Watson, lecturer of ‘Systems, Power and Energy’ at the University of Glasgow believes BioMara’s research could eventually lead to the next step of green energy.

“Bio-diesel and bio-ethanol production – the production of those oils can fit into existing infrastructure which makes a lot of sense commercially and will eventually make these fuels more viable in the long term.”

Although BioMara says it doesn’t have an estimate for when algae will be commercially available for cars, it believes it will be in this generation.