My system has demonstrated (in a 1000 litre bioreactor) an increase in CO2 utilization from 10 percent to 100 percent. No gas bubbles left the surface of the algae solution. The accepted fact is that algae cannot be blended at high flow rates due to excessive shear rates caused by propellers or turbines. In my system, the shear rate is low enough to blend and pump organic material without harming it. Further, my system allows algae the correct amount of time to fully absorb the available CO2 gas. If a known volume of algae has a specific rate of CO2 absorption, and a system is tuned to deliver that amount, my system can utilize 100 percent of the CO2 gas. This increases or maximizes the algae growth rate and harvest potential.
The main goal of the work is to utilize CO2 emissions from industry and fully convert that CO2 into biomass, biofuel, ethanol, and solid fuel. Existing algae based biofuel systems have two specific weaknesses. Scale-up from the lab, and CO2 utilization. My work in scale-up has been successful largely in part to the mathematical models I have built based on my design. The model uses significantly less power in this scenario. Large scale CO2 sparger or bubbler systems would consume tens of thousands of horsepower on a large refinery-scale. Using my method, this could be less than 500 horsepower in total due to the unique method of delivery.
Large scale pumping and blending of shear sensitive, organic material is indeed possible, and with enhanced CO2 utilization methods, algae based biofuel systems are a practical method of eliminating CO2 emissions in industry.
