Today in Biofuels Opinion: “Why algae, and why ExxonMobil?”

From Renewable Energy World: “Corn ethanol is one of the worst wastes of biomass: An acre of corn produces about 330 gallons/year if you cook it using fossil fuel. Use the ethanol as a heat source and the net yield drops to 214 gallons/year.  Car gas mileage is 30% lower with ethanol. At 25 miles/gallon we can only drive 25 X 214 = 5350 miles per year on an acre of corn. If we take that same acre of corn and burn it to make electricity to charge an electric car, we will be able to drive the car 22 times as far!  About 117,096 miles per year!”

From Energy Tribune: “The fundamental question I’ve been pondering is “why”? Why algae, and why ExxonMobil? For all of algae’s enormous potential to produce large quantities of useful fuel, skepticism that this could ever be done economically on a useful scale abounds. The answer to both questions likely resides in a word…scale…Simplistically, if the acreage currently devoted to growing corn for ethanol were devoted to oil-excreting algae, it could replace nearly 60% of our gasoline supply from crude oil, rather than the 5% or so we get from ethanol.”

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