Thrown-together Algae Photobioreactor

Well i was curious, so why not?

bucket & rain water.
got the fishtank airpump, hoses & bubblers from a pet store for under $40

you can use tapwater too, it'll take a day or so in the sun for the chlorine to disappear.

I didn't have any algae to start off with, this stuff just grew in there on it's own. In a few months this is what my new pet looks like.

No fertiliser (cept the bees that drown themselves). I'm considering peeing into it.
no CO2.
just air bubbling through and direct sunlight.

couldn't be cheaper.

If you're wondering what the other thing is becide the white bucket, it's another bucket i've lined with cheap reflective Mylar (ie: an emergency blanket). The shiny aluminium layer is eroding off in the water though - should have faced it backwards.

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I'm planning on grabbing some clear "polytube" packaging plastic and using that instead of the bucket. Like these guys: http://tribes.tribe.net/chlorophyllcollective/photos

Also i'll add a bit of pee into it, nitrates! Should make it go mental.

I wonder if algae could be used instead of tree plantations - for CO2 offsets. Afterall algae is the fastest growing (and fastest CO2 absorbing) plant, why bother planting trees?

It grows at an insane speed if you directly feed it CO2 emissions (and some are doing this, see my other videos), but even if you just feed it normal air it grows way faster than trees.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• CO2
• carbon
• dioxide
• offset
• algae
• photobioreactor
• bioreactor
• cheap
• ghetto
• pet
• pump
• air
• bubbler
• junkyard
• plant
• fish

[chemistNATE]

I think the reason algae isn't used for CO2 offset, is that it dies too quickly. Once a tree absorbs a CO2 molecule, it's tied up in the tree for hundreds of years. Algae, unless it's kept alive, dies pretty easily. Keeping it alive would be the toughest part, where would it all be stored?

[roidroid]

@chemistNATE perhaps it could be stored deep underground in now-empty oil and gas reservoirs. As either dead algae cake (might be troublesome as a solid), or just biodiesel, or perhaps just pure CO2 (if the algae is grown and then combusted in a powerplant - solely for the purpose of sequestering CO2).

or, it could be partially combusted and turned into biochar. And then that could be stored anywhere, even tilled into the soil to improve fertility.

Does wood really last hundreds of years?

[goose2goose2]

I guess I miss the point of this video..

what are you trying to show us...

[roidroid]

Algae is a very promising biofuel crop.

I wanted to show just how prevalent it is, that it will prettymuch grow by itself with minimal effort and outlay.

[azraaell]

i would say on reflection and the pasage of time that i would like to retract the ultimate maning of dooomed doooomed i say to earth is in the hand of the humens when the book of life has no writing, lets see what happens before satge 3

[roidroid]

what?

[YouAdamNazzkl0wn]

Ironically- he's trying to grow algae next to the pool- where he dumps all those chemicals - to kill algae!!!

[JehuMcSpooran]

I've found that about 50-100mL of old urine in a 2L coke bottle works really well.

[uniftee]

How much energy did the bubbler take?

[stanley03061973]

You shouldnt have dolphines in D pool ,Mate .LOL

[goose2goose2]

put some paint on them and brighten them up a little.

SO..how's things with you?

[goose2goose2]

It's probably way OU ,but it too needs magnets replaced every ten years

so you can't call it PM...( those two ugly words that engineers hate so much )

Anyway...I've only begin testing these and they have some pretty cool

qualities...if you get them up to fairly high speed on the bike..

the amp draw falls way off..down to less than an Amp...at 25mph

level ground...I haven't gone very far with it..less than fifty miles

at a time...but it see good so far...

[goose2goose2]

The prototype is a real ugly piece of work..but hey it's

better than I had hoped.

The next new piece ....you gonna probably need some

help with this one...

a six cylinder - ( in line ) pendulum motor...