Company Name Algenol Biofuel	Company Web Site http://www.algenolbiofuels.com/	Headquarters Loxahatchee, FL
Latest News December 3, 2009 Algenol was awarded a $25 million grant from the Department of Energy to make ethanol directly from carbon dioxide and seawater using algae. The facility will have the capacity to produce 100,000 gallons of fuelgrade ethanol per year. ----------------- June 30, 2009 (From earth2tech.com) This morning Algenol Biofuels, a Naples, Fla.-based company that uses carbon dioxide from power plants to grow algae in order to make ethanol, tells the New York Times that it is building a demonstration plant with Dow Chemical on a 24-acre site at Dow Chemical's property in Freeport, Texas, which will house 3,100 bioreactors (clear troughs that grow algae) that will be able to produce up to 100,000 gallons of ethanol per year. Dow Chemical will provide the plastic material for the bioreactors. It's interested in Algenol's algae tech in order to use the ethanol produced as an ingredient for plastics to replace the use of natural gas. While many companies are working on ways to create ethanol to power vehicles, the bioplastics space has been relatively neglected. For the demo project Algenol is also working with researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology, the Membrane Technology and Research, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to improve the process and study algae fuel. Algenol was founded in 2006 and uses a slightly different approach to algae fuel than its competitors. While most algae-to-fuel startups grow algae so they can process the algae directly into fuel, Algenol collects ethanol vapors from the algae, which involves neither killing the plants nor the use of an expensive refining process. The company has reportedly raised $70 million in private backing to build out its innovation and beyond the Dow Chemical partnership Algenol has said it has an agreement with Sonora Fields (a wholly owned subsidiary of Mexican-owned BioFields) to build an $850 million project that will deliver a billion gallons of fuel a year. ---- Another report on this matter follows. The Dow Chemical Co. will partner with a Florida-based company to turn carbon dioxide -- the most prevalent greenhouse gas -- into ethanol. Dow and Naples-based Algenol Biofuels Inc. could produce 100,000 gallons of ethanol per year for use in making plastics. The algae-based biorefinery will be built on 24 acres at Dow's site in Freeport, Texas, where it will use carbon dioxide produced at a nearby Dow manufacturing facility. Algenol applied for $25 million in stimulus funds to cover half the costs of the Dow project, according to Algenol CEO Paul Woods. He expects the Department of Energy (DOE) to announce the awards between September and December. The funding will be divided into three phases: final plans and permitting, construction and operation. "Our engineering work is done," Woods told ClimateBiz.com and GreenBiz.com Monday, adding the companies would like to pursue "a timeline as accelerated as they would allow. We're ready." In addition to CO2, Algenol's technology also requires salt water, sunlight and non-arable land to produce the ethanol. The company grows the algae in clear photobioreactors, where the algae secrete ethanol that can be easily captured. The process can produce 6,000 gallons of ethanol per acre of land, compared to corn-based ethanol, which produces 400 gallons per acre; Algenol's ethanol's carbon footprint is 80 percent smaller than that of petroleum. Aside from supplying the CO2 from its manufacturing plant, Dow will develop advanced materials and specialty films for the bioreactors. The project would consume about 2 tons of CO2 daily, twice the minimum 1 ton-per-day threshold required under the DOE grant program. Woods estimates the pilot would operate for four to five years, or long enough to prove it can be scaled commercially. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Georgia Institute of Technology and Membrane Technology and Research Inc. will also contribute to the project. Algenol, founded in 2006, has a similar but much larger project underway in Mexico with partner Sonora Fields S.A.P.I. de C.V., a subsidiary of Biofields. The $850 million project now in the permitting stage is a demonstration-scale project that will have the capacity to produce 1 billion gallons of ethanol per year. By 2011, Algenol would like to have the permitting in place for another three algae-to-ethanol plants in the U.S., Woods said, split between Texas and Florida. ----------------------- ------------------------------------ October 11, 2008 Algenol Biofuels of Loxahatchee, Fla., is developing technology to make ethanol from primitive ocean microbes called cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae. These cyanobacteria get their energy from the sun by photosynthesis, the same process used in plants. Cyanobacteria have major advantages over plants such as corn as an energy crop. They grow quickly and live in seawater, of which there is a virtually limitless supply. In June, Algenol said it had received $100 million from a business partner, BioFields, that plans to start growing cyanobacteria in Mexico next year. BioFields said it is investing $850 million in the project. Making ethanol from cyanobacteria, if it can be done economically, would represent a vast new energy source. In addition to making ethanol, the process produces fresh water, oxygen and agricultural fertilizer, and removes carbon dioxide from the air. Moreover, making ethanol from cyanobacteria would not use a food crop, as is the case now with ethanol made from corn. The spike in corn prices this year has been blamed in part on the growing demand for corn for ethanol.
Funding Algenol is privately funded and not seeking outside investment during these stages of development and primary commercialization. As plants are expanded and the business grows, Algenol expects to engage in partnering arrangements in order to rapidly scale ethanol production worldwide. Algenol's ongoing financing needs will continue to be financed privately through the initial commercialization phase but Algenol will continue to investigate the optimal funding opportunities including; licensing fees and royalty payments, partnering arrangements, government financial support and government land access for facilities.
Technology 1. Initial proof of science was generated by Dr. John Coleman at the University of Toronto between 1989 and 1999. Since then, the process has been refined to allow algae to tolerate high heat, high salinity, and the alcohol levels present in ethanol production. 2. The Direct to EthanolTM process links sugar production to photosynthesis with enzymes within individual algae cells. The enzymes are naturally occurring and are the same as those used to produce bread, beer and wine, thus pose no known risks to humans. 3. There are over 100,000 species of blue-green algae useable with rapid growth cycles, high photosynthesis efficiency, large sugar storage attributes that Algenol has access to in refining algae with its Direct to EthanolTM process. The algae are metabolically enhanced to produce ethanol while being resistant to high temperature, high salinity, and high ethanol levels, which were previous barriers to ramping to commercial scale volumes. 4. Algenol's prototype production strains are producing ethanol at a rate of 6,000 gallons/acre/year, and are expected to improve to 10,000 gallons/acre/year by the end of 2008. With further refinement, the algae cells have the potential to increase production rates to 12,000 to 40,000 gallons/acre/year in the future. 5. Algenol only uses algae strains that do not produce human toxins. In addition, the specific algae cells used cannot live in the environment found outside their Capture TechnologyTM contained sealed bioreactor. 6. Scientific priority is placed on developing regional specific algae organisms to disperse ethanol production globally ahead of cell production gains. This will result in Algenol partnered production locations in multiple countries with inexpensive desert land with different saline or seawater sources, climates and CO2 sources. 7. Algenol has the ability to produce ethanol using atmospheric nitrogen consuming algae. As the algae organism dies, it has the additional economic benefit of being able to be composted into nitrogen rich fertilizer for the agricultural industry, further reducing the fossil fuel requirements associated with traditional fertilizer. 8. Complementary to its Direct to EthanolTM initiative, Algenol is building a CO2 to "x" or multi-carbon platform to leverage the technology to produce other high value carbon-based molecules such as plastics and polymers. ----------------------- 1. Algenol produces ethanol by growing metabolically enhanced algae in proprietary Capture TechnologyTM bioreactors. These bioreactors are contained and sealed units that hold algae in the bioreactor, prevent contamination, maximize ethanol recovery and allow for fresh water recovery. 2. The prototype Capture TechnologyTM bioreactors designs are operational, with scaled designs currently being field tested. To date, the ethanol volume recovery and initial ethanol separation efficiency are consistent with commercial production targets. 3. The photobioreactor is of a special design that supports the algae by allowing for the growth parameters to be tightly maintained. CO2, nutrients, water, pH, temperature, salinity and other environmental conditions have to be controlled to allow the algae to produce ethanol. Without proper growing conditions, the algae do not prosper and do not produce ethanol. 4. Algenol's proprietary process is designed to take advantage of non-arable land and is suitable to many non-arable geographic locations without winter freezes. This complements rather than competes with human food production. 5. The process to make ethanol is carbon negative and consumes 1.5 million tons of CO2 per 100 million gallons of ethanol produced. The Biofields Mexico facility includes a small power plant, which provides around 2-3 million metric tonne (MT) of CO2, enough for 300 mgpy of ethanol production. Additional CO2 will be obtained from industrial and/or atmospheric sources. The Biofields Mexico facility has an eventual capacity between 1 and 2 Billion Gallons per Year.
Other Info Algenol's DIRECT TO ETHANOL" technology can produce ethanol at an affordable price. 1. Algenol can sell ethanol at a price that is cheaper than any other fuel all across the United States. 2. Algenol produces ethanol at a rate of over 6,000 gallons per acre per year. "(Corn produces around 370 gallons per acre per year). "(Sugarcane produces around 890 gallons per acre per year). 3. Algenol will exceed its target 10,000 gallons per acre per year by the end of 2008 Algenol intends to become the world's largest recycler or utilizer of CO2. 1. One ton of CO2 is converted into approximately 60-70 gallons of ethanol. 2. 1.5 million metric tons of CO2 can be converted into approximately 100 million gallons of ethanol. 3. Over 90% of the CO2 is captured during the process. 4. Over 50% of the CO2 is utilized during in the process. 5. Algenol can use captured industrial or captured atmospheric CO2 in its process. 6. We say here today that Algenol will accept all the carbon dioxide that companies give us. Algenol's DIRECT TO ETHANOL" technology can produce ethanol on an industrial scale because it is modular. 1. Algenol has partnered with BioFields in Mexico and will begin producing ethanol in 2009. 2. Algenol's process is completely modular, therefore scale-up is manageable. 3. BioFields can produce over 1 billion gallons per year as this facility expands over the next few years. 4. Algenol designs and builds it proprietary photobioreactors for its partners. Algenol creates proprietary enclosed and sealed, contained photobioreactors to grow algae in, as well as to capture the ethanol within the photobioreactors. 5. Algenol designs the process to effectively run its system and produce ethanol. 6. Algenol's Intellectual Property portfolio encompasses molecular and marine biology, process systems, and mechanical and chemical engineering.