Growth of microalgae with increased calorific values in a tubular bioreactor

By A. Scragg, A. Illman, A. Carden, S. Shales. 2002

312 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract In order to use microalgae as a fuel the algae should be of high calorific value and must be capable of growth in large volumes. Chlorella vulgaris and C. emersonii have been shown to grow in a 230 l pumped tubular photobioreactor in Watanabe's medium and a low nitrogen medium. The low nitrogen medium induces higher lipid accumulation in both algae, which increased their calorific value. The highest calorific value was obtained with C. vulgaris (28 kJ g −1 ) grown in low nitrogen medium. However, the biomass productivity was 24 mg dry wt l −1 d −1 in the low nitrogen medium which was lower than in Watanabe's medium (40 mg dry wt l −1 d −1 ) and represents a reduced energy recovery.

Subfields: Aquatic Science, Environmental Chemistry, Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/7ab2f60b5defb9a67efa56215ef54687cdb078b4

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Citations in the corpus

Biodiesel from algae: challenges and prospects. (2010, background): “Typical configurations tested at either laboratory or pilot scale have included vertical, flat plate reactors [9], annular reactors [11 ], or arrangements of plastic bags operated as batches [12 ], and various forms of tubular reactor, either pumped mechanically [13] or by air-lift [14].”
CO2 bio-mitigation using microalgae (2008, background): “…et al. 1997 Artificial wastewater Chlorella vulgaris air 25 0.040 0.075a Scragg et al. 2002 Watanabe’s medium Chlorella vulgaris air 25 0.024 0.045a Scragg et al. 2002 Low-N medium Chlorella sp. 40 42 N/A 1.0 Sakai et al. 1995 Dunaliella 3 27 0.17 0.313a Kishimoto et al. 1994 High salinity,…”
Advances and perspectives in using microalgae to produce biodiesel (2011, background): “5–7% in ponds and close photobioreactors [36,37]; in the former case, this translates to a yield of 30– 40 gdry biomass m 2 d 1 [4].”
Pilot scale semicontinuous production of Spirulina biomass in southern Brazil. (2009, unknown): “0 kJ g−1 reported for microalgae (Scragg et al., 2001).”
Factors affecting lipid accumulation by Nannochloropsis oculata in a two-stage cultivation process (2011, background): “Microalgal-adsorbed CO2 can be converted into a high calorific lipid (Chisti 2007; Scragg et al. 2002, 2003; Xu et al. 2006).”
Effect of UV stress on the fatty acid and lipid class composition in two marine microalgae Pavlova lutheri (Pavlovophyceae) and Odontella aurita (Bacillariophyceae) (2010, background): “These results could be explained by the fact that most microalgae accumulate lipids when exposed to nutrient-limited conditions (Illman et al. 2000; Scragg et al. 2002).”
Thermophilic biohydrogen production using pre-treated algal biomass as substrate (2014, background): “The helical tubular design has certain advantages like it has a large surface-to-volume ratio, easy control on mass transfer property of gases and occupies a small ground area thus considered as a convenient setup for indoor pilot plant operation [27].”
Prospective of biodiesel production utilizing microalgae as the cell factories: A comprehensive discussion (2010, background): “This generally results in lowering of biomass and subsequently in total lipid content (Li et al., 2008; Scragg et al., 2002).”
Efficacy of microalgae for industrial wastewater treatment: a review on operating conditions, treatment efficiency and biomass productivity (2016, background): “Most of the closed bioreactors will have tubes of various sizes, shapes, lengths and also made up of either glass or plastic, usually termed as tubular closed bioreactors (Travieso et al. 2001; Scragg et al. 2002).”
Classification of macroalgae as fuel and its thermochemical behaviour. (2008, background): “Much of the existing research in energy and fuels from algae has been devoted towards biodegradation, methane production and biodiesel production from microalgae (Scragg et al., 2002.”
Cultivation, photobioreactor design and harvesting of microalgae for biodiesel production: a critical review. (2011, background): “Sukenik et al. (1988) studied a combined flocculation process with marine microalgae.”