Shell plans algae farm for biofuel
Shell plans algae farm for biofuel
By BOB KEEFE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 12/12/07
Los Angeles — A day after breaking ground in Texas on the nation’s
biggest oil refinery, Royal Dutch Shell PLC announced it is building
a fuel refinery of a very different type: an algae farm and
laboratory in Hawaii that will produce vegetable oil that can be
converted to biofuel.
The project on the Kona coast of Hawaii will be a demonstration and
test facility, Shell’s U.S. president said. But if it works as
planned, Shell and Hawaiian partner HR Biopetroleum Inc. could build
a full-scale production plant elsewhere that could produce
commercially available biodiesel based on algae oil in the near
future.
Algae is promising as a biofuel because it grows quickly, is rich in
vegetable oil and can be cultivated in sea water, reducing the use
of land and fresh water. Other oil companies have recently launched
similar experiments.
“This will demonstrate the efficacy of the process,” John
Hofmeister, president of Shell’s Houston-based U.S. subsidiary,
Shell Oil Co., said after announcing the project at an environmental
conference here Tuesday. “The next step would be a pilot production
for commercial [production] , and the next stage would be
commercialization. ”
Monday, Shell and partner Saudi Aramco broke ground on a $7 billion
expansion of what will become the nation’s biggest traditional oil
refinery in Port Arthur, northeast of Galveston, Texas.
Hofmeister called the back-to-back moves an example of what’s needed
to address the growing energy problem in the United States.
“We’re living in both the new world and the old world … because we
have a very serious [energy] problem in this country,” he said.
In a speech at the GreenXchange conference here, Hofmeister blasted
the energy bill currently being debated in Congress, saying it
doesn’t do enough to promote new oil and gas exploration, the
development of new energy sources or protect the country’s existing
energy resources.
As a result, he predicted, the nation will continue plodding along
without a comprehensive energy policy, consuming 10,000 gallons of
oil every second of every day – something that’s good for his
company but bad for the consumers and the country.
“That’s a swimming pool of oil every second – and that demand still
grows,” he said. “This notion that we can somehow continue to import
oil to meet growing demand keeps us ever closer to the razor’s edge
of energy insecurity.”
Of course many environmental activists and others point to Shell and
other oil companies as a big part of the problem for the country’s
dependency on oil. Many accuse Shell and other big oil companies
of “greenwashing” – trying to look more environmentally friendly
than they are – with half-hearted renewable energy projects.
But Hofmeister pointed out that Shell has been working on renewable
energy projects for a decade. It has invested $1 billion in such
projects in the last five years alone, he said.
“You don’t greenwash for 10 years … you do real work,” he said in
a brief interview. “This is real serious.”
While the algae refining test facility is the Shell’s first foray
into that sort of biofuel, it also is testing wind, hydrogen and
ethanol production.
The goal, Hofmeister said, is for Shell to create a profitable
business from renewables by 2015.
The new Shell-HR Biopetroleum joint venture, called Cellana, will
operate on about six acres of land and sea leased from the National
Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority. Scientists from universities
in Mississippi, Hawaii and Canada also will be involved.
The companies did not disclose the cost of the facility.
http://www.ajc. com/business/ content/business /stories/ 2007/12/11/ shell_1212.html
