oilgae: CO2-Sequestration

Showing posts with label CO2-Sequestration. Show all posts

Monday, February 23, 2009

Pigs, Cows and Chicken Make Algae in Zambia

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Kayaletu Makasi lives on a pretty little smallholding on the road to Chintsa, Zambia. He has 17 cows, three pigs and a gaggle of chickens. He feeds their manure (about 20 litres a week) into a small digester and in return he gets an unlimited supply of free fuel, highly nutritious food for the pigs and chickens, and a treasure trove of organic fertilizer for his soil.

The animal food comes in the form of a bright green, protein- packed algae called Chlorella which forms on the water afterwords.

Well, as we have posted many times before, algae cultivation for dairy farms and related businesses that deal in animals is an exciting area and it is indeed an excellent approach towards producing energy from waste.

The trick is to simply grow the algae in the effluents from the digester. You have treated the water efficient, and you have algae - use it as a fertilizer, animal food or biofuels or as all three, that's your wish!

There is one another method by which you can further contribute to reduced GHGs. When you burn the methane, funnel the CO2 that results into the tank that contains the effluent water in which algae are growing. The algae grow even faster and the CO2 is consumed!

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Thursday, October 26, 2006

Terra Preta - CO2 sequestration with Amazonian Dark Earth

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Terra Preta: Black is the New Green - David Zaks and Chad Monfreda @ this World Chaging article

Excerpts:

1. Technical geosequestration methods for CO2 could pump large amounts of CO2 deep underground but are still under development. On the other hand, natural methods that store carbon in living ecosystems may be possible in the short term but require huge swathes of land
2. An ideal solution, however, would combine the quick fix of biological methods with the absolute potential of technical ones. Terra preta may do just that.
3. Amazonian Dark Earth, or terra preta do indio is three times richer in nitrogen and phosphorous, and twenty times the carbon of normal soils, terra preta is the legacy of ancient Amazonians who predate Western civilization...
4. The difference between terra preta and ordinary soils is immense. A hectare of meter-deep terra preta can contain 250 tonnes of carbon, as opposed to 100 tonnes in unimproved soils from similar parent material...
5. There are some who believe that that a strategy combining biochar with biofuels could ultimately offset 9.5 billion tons of carbon per year-an amount equal to the total current fossil fuel emissions!
6. Danny Day, the founder of a company called Eprida is experimenting with systems that turn farm waste into hydrogen, biofuel, and biochar. He says, "We don't maximize for hydrogen; we don't maximize for biodisel; we don't maximize for char...By being a little bit inefficient in each, we approximate nature and get a completely efficient cycle."
7. Terra preta's full beauty appears in this closed loop. Unlike traditional sequestration rates that follow diminishing marginal returns-aquifers fill up, forests mature-practices based on terra preta see increasing returns.

Full article here

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Friday, October 20, 2006

Services of Algae to the Environment

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Techno-Economic Study of CO2 Capture Process for Cement Plants

Sequestration of Carbon Di Oxide (CO2) in the Dutch Part of North Sea

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Sequestration of Carbon Di Oxide (CO2) in the Dutch Part of North Sea

Nov 2002

A bilingual (Dutch and English) popular scientific report on the
possible effects (on the seabed and organisms) and consequences of
dumping and sequestering carbon dioxide (CO2) on and in the seabed
of the Dutch Continental Shelf (known in the Netherlands by the
acronym NCP).

The report contains advice based on this information to Directie Noordzee about
the scientific, social and political consequences of dumping CO2 in the
Dutch part of the North Sea, so that Directie Noordzee can determine
what stance to adopt for the London Dumping Convention.

Introduction

Greenhouse effect

During the last 420,000 years the average CO2 concentration on earth
has varied between 180 and 280 particles per million per volume
(ppmv). However, since the industrial revolution, more and more CO2
has ended up in the atmosphere as a result of the increasing use of fossil
fuels; the current concentration is 370 ppmv. Furthermore, it is
estimated that if nothing changes, by 2100 this concentration will be
approximately 750 ppmv. It is thus assumed that the CO2 concentration
in the atmosphere will rise to an unacceptable level in the next 500
years, as this rise will lead to a global strengthening of the greenhouse
effect and associated climate change.

One of the results of the 1997 Kyoto Climate Conference was the
commitment by all EU countries to reduce annual emissions of
greenhouse gases (including CO2) in the period 2008-2012 by eight
percent with respect to the 1990 level. In 1998, the Netherlands agreed
to this under certain conditions, and the joint objective was translated
into a national reduction of six percent with respect to the 1990 level, to
be achieved in the period 2008-2012.

Sources
The average worldwide anthropogenic emission of CO2 is approximately
7.4 gigatons C per year (1997). This will rise to 26 GtC/year by 2100 (1
gigaton is 109 ton). The total emission of CO2 for the Netherlands in
2000 was 50 Mt C (106 ton).

Sources of CO2 include: power stations, industry, homes, traffic and
transport, agriculture and horticulture, gas and oil extraction. The
emissions of v by large point sources, such as heavy industry and power
generation represent about a third of total worldwide anthropogenic
emissions; in the Netherlands this accounts for about 56 percent.
Reducing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere can be achieved
in various ways, for instance by economising on energy use or by
producing more materials in which carbon is sequestered for a long
period of time (e.g. plastic and wood). In the short term, possible
options include sequestering CO2 in seawater and in the ground or the
seabed under conditions that prevent its uncontrolled leakage back into
the atmosphere.

Two important CO2 releasing processes can be distinguished: burning of
organic matter and separation of CO2 from other gasses. By nature,
natural gas contains up to 70% CO2, which must be removed before
the gas can be used by the consumer. Sequestration of CO2 in seawater
or bottom needs pure CO2. From a technical point of view it is possible
to separate CO2 from other gasses. However, this process needs energy
and consequently an additional release of CO2. It is estimated that
about 30% more CO2 is produced in this purifying process. A complete
Sequestration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the Dutch part of the North Sea

Life Cycle Analysis, comparing the efficiency of different matter and
energy fluxes, is net yet performed. In addition it is remarkable that in the literature studied, only the sources, path and fate of CO2 as a gas is followed, and little is mentioned about the fate of other (greenhouse) gasses (e.g. nitrogen
and sulphur oxides).

This memorandum evaluates the pros and cons of sequestering carbon in the sea and the possible associated risks. Sequestration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the Dutch
part of the North Sea National Institute for Coastal and Marine Management/RIKZ

Find the full report here (PDF)

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