Tina Casey “Algae Biofuels Rises From Grave To Haunt Fossil Fuels Stakeholders” CleanTechnica Dec 2023 https://cleantechnica.com/2023/12/19/algae-biofuel-haunts-fossil-fuel-stakeholders/ 

Algae provides a massive benefit for the environment, and it has a massive potential for fuel; algae has been farmed because of this potential but it’s not used commonly because of the difficulty it is to farm. Algae is a delicate crop to care for and an algae farm can be destroyed by one pest infestation; but the pay off is massive algae acts as a sponge for CO2 so placing a farm massively reduces carbon emissions. Algae has also been found to have the potential to be used as a fuel source. Algae biofuel is carbon recycling, the carbon that was used to grow the algae is released back when the algae is being used as fuel, allowing for it to be carbon neutral meaning that there won’t be an excessive amount of CO2 when released back out. The Gingko project aims to find a way to better grow algae by preventing pest infestation. This project is focusing on short chains of amino acids that exhibit antimicrobial activity. They plan to go further with algae if their method of pest prevention succeeds, as they find more opportunity with algae, finding that it can be commercially viable, as they believe it can be used for cosmetics, nutritional supplements, and can be used as bioplastics.

I find it amazing that algae has so much potential. I knew that it had been used commercially in cities in order to reduce the amount of carbon, but I hadn’t known that it could be used as fuel. I find its drawback to be that it’s carbon neutral. Algae biofuel, is only using the CO2 it has consumed to then be used as fuel, but I can see how this can be viable further in the future, if the excessive amount of carbon emissions has dropped algae can be helpful because if its necessities to be farmed is refined, algae farms can produce a lot of algae and can aid in the amount of fuel that the nation needs.