PTT plans to commercialise algae-based fuel by 2017
To reduce fossil-fuel consumption, PTT has set its sights on introducing algae-based energy by 2017 and it is keen on setting up production facilities in Australia in the near future, according to the head of company.
The national petroleum company revealed that it was already in partnership with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia’s national science agency, to develop a project involving algae-oil extraction.
“Oil extracted from micro-algae is considered the third generation of biofuel and it is also one of our key milestones to maintain the country’s energy security,” PTT president and chief executive Pailin Chuchottaworn said.
Though the partnership with CSIRO is just in the early stage, Pailin said his company anticipated huge opportunities from production of algal oils, in two aspects. First is that PTT could transfer know-how and expertise about bio-products from algal oil from the Australian science agency to the firm’s research centre to study up to five potential strains of freshwater algae for use by the Kingdom.
Second is that the company might set up a production base for algae-based fuel in Australia, where venture-capital firms are interested in investing in such alternative energy.
Australia also has geographical advantages such as long coastlines and large, flat deserts in the interior under year-around sunshine and stable atmospheric conditions. Given these factors, Australia is one of the best places to grow marine micro-algae for oil extraction.
Vijit Tangnoi, executive vice president of PTT Research and Technology Institute, said that under the initial cooperation with CSIRO, his institute would focus on screening and optimisation of fatty-acid methyl ester (FAME) from selected marine algae and on genetic modification of those strains.
Currently the research and development of fuel extracted from marine algae costs about three to four times as much as palm-oil-based biodiesel.
Vijit said that if algae-based fuel could be commercialised, it would help maintain national energy security by reducing reliance on fossil fuels. It could also replace widely used renewable energy sources such as palm oil and sugar-cane ethanol.
John Manners, chief of CSIRO Plant Industry, said large-scale production of algal oils was feasible without competing with food crops, but it needed to be economically viable.
It appears that the practical commercialisation of algae-based biofuel is a long way off, but many major oil companies in developed countries are putting this innovative alternative fuel in their focus.
Kunn Kangwansaichol, a researcher at PTT’s petroleum-products and alternative-fuels research department, pointed to ExxonMobil’s algae-derived biofuels programme. The US company has earmarked about US$600 million (Bt18 billion) for this programme with the goal of developing algae-based fuel by 2019.
Likewise, PTT plans to develop this alternative energy source and use it commercially by 2017, though the current development remains in the first phase.
