Alternative energy from marine algae

Rapid growth in natural saltwater environments and high sugar content are two outstanding advantages that make seaweed a potential material for the production of biofuels and renewable chemicals.

Scientists from the Science magazine said scientists at the Biological Architecture Laboratory in California are working hard to create a bacterium that can turn sugar in brown seaweed into one. Future energy sources can replace oil and coal.

Brown algae

The reason why seaweed is noticed and selected because they have high sugar content without lignin (about 60% of the biomass of marine algae is sugar) and also do not require arable land or freshwater environment to grow as some other materials.

In particular, according to scientists' calculations, it is easy to harvest 60 billion gallons of alternative biofuels by exploiting marine algae over 3% of the length of the Earth's coastline.

That is also the reason why seaweed cultivation activities for commercial purposes are increasingly being replicated in many countries around the world.

Currently, the idea of ​​turning seaweed into an alternative energy source is still in the research stage. However, when completed and put into practical use, this type of technology promises to create more and more fuels and renewable chemicals without the use of land or fresh water as transmitting crops. maize, sugarcane, cassava .

The above research by US scientists is considered a breakthrough in efforts to find and open new directions for the renewable energy industry in the near future.