By Mary-Clare Liening

Geoff Horst, chief science officer of Algal Scientific Corporation, is a doctoral student at Michigan State University. Horst is also part of an award-winning team that has developed a process that uses algae for waste water treatment and nutrient recovery.

“We’re trying to address two major global concerns: clean water and clean energy,” said Horst, “and we can do that with one process.”

The project started as an idea for a clean energy competition sponsored by DTE Energy. After earning the $65,000 first place prize, Team Algal Scientific Corporation invested its winnings directly into their company.

“The major concept of the company is that we take waste water from an industrial processor, let’s say a brewery or some sort of other food and beverage processor, and we actually clean up that waste water right there on sight, so we use all the nutrients that are in that waste water to help grow the algae,” said Horst.

Horst compares the process to the creation of an algae bloom, but in a controlled space. The bloom soaks up all of the nutrients in the process of cleaning up the water.

“So we have these fast-growing algae that are soaking up the nutrients, and then when we harvest the algae out of the water it makes this really nice biomass which you can convert into all sorts of things,” Horst said. “So it’s just like corn that you would convert into ethanol or soybeans which you would convert into biodiesel.”

The corporation has moved past its initial stages of testing and is currently building a pilot plant at a farm in Michigan, moving the science from the lab to a working prototype.

“The main advantage is in how you actually have grown that biomass…the nice thing about algae is that you can actually grow it much faster on a smaller parcel of land so the yield of the biomass that you can get per unit area of land is really high,” said Horst.

Horst also noted that the algae can be grown on old, dilapidated land, or wherever land is cheap, saving highly reproductive land for growing food crops and agriculture.

Source: Mlive.com