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Article
Techno-Economic Analysis of Biofuel Production from Macroalgae (Seaweed)
Bioengineering
  • Mohsen Soleymani, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz
  • Kurt A. Rosentrater, Iowa State University
Document Type
Article
Publication Version
Published Version
Publication Date
11-1-2017
DOI
10.3390/bioengineering4040092
Abstract

A techno-economic evaluation of bioenergy production from macroalgae was carried out in this study. Six different scenarios were examined for the production of different energy products and by-products. Seaweed was produced either via the longline method or the grid method. Final products of these scenarios were either ethanol from fermentation, or electricity from anaerobic digestion (AD). By-products were digestate for AD, and animal feed, or electricity and digestate, for the fermentation pathway. Bioenergy breakeven selling prices were investigated according to the cost components and the feedstock supply chain, while suggestions for potential optimization of costs were provided. The lowest production level of dry seaweed to meet 0.93 ($/L) for ethanol fuel and 0.07 $/kW-h for electricity was found to be 0.68 and 3.7 million tonnes (dry basis), respectively. At the moment, biofuel production from seaweed has been determined not to be economically feasible, but achieving economic production may be possible by lowering production costs and increasing the area under cultivation.

Comments

This article is published as Soleymani, Mohsen, and Kurt A. Rosentrater. "Techno-Economic Analysis of Biofuel Production from Macroalgae (Seaweed)." Bioengineering 4, no. 4 (2017): 92. DOI: 10.3390/bioengineering4040092. Posted with permission.

Access
Open
Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Copyright Owner
The Authors
Language
en
File Format
application/pdf
Citation Information
Mohsen Soleymani and Kurt A. Rosentrater. "Techno-Economic Analysis of Biofuel Production from Macroalgae (Seaweed)" Bioengineering Vol. 4 Iss. 4 (2017) p. 92
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/kurt_rosentrater/315/