Reviewer Comments - EERE

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2011 Algae Platform Review – Reviewer Comments Reviewer Comments are direct transcripts of commentary and material provided by the Platform’s Review Panel. They have not been edited or altered by the Biomass Program. Reviewer Comments Reviewer: 1 Criteria Score: 2 I have difficulty following the relevance. Can we not use US samples from northern waters? Will algae culture in northern waters make any economic sense? How does flue gas factor in the relevance? Reviewer: 2 Criteria Score: 4 The relevance of the strain discovery is unclear; more nutrient demand and lipid production characterization will be needed, based upon information presented. What is the sustainability (buffering of flue gas supply of CO2 etc.)? Reviewer: 3 Criteria Score: 5 The work addresses goals in the area of Feedstock Supply Ft-B. Sustainable Production: By utilizing information generated by resource assessment (SNL) culture conditions can be established to match optimal deployment area. Ft-C. Feedstock Genetics and Development: Genetic diversity in algal culture collection will provide strains with potential for commercialization of algal biofuel production in vast area of North America beyond the southeastern US and gulf states. Reviewer: 5 Criteria Score: 3 Although project goals are relevant to biomass program goals, there was no plausible explanation why this project would be successful in producing algal strains that would thrive in full scale production systems. Reviewer: 7 Criteria Score: 3 The work is very unlikely to lead to advancement in biofuel technology. Presenter Response 3.A. We believe that Canadian water samples have the potential to provide strains better suited for local deployment. Although, this may only provide a slight improvement in our overall probability of success, the water sampling was a task for the NRC. Hence there was no advantage to choosing US water samples. At the moment, even optimistic estimates for algal biofuel production costs without benefit of a high value co-product indicate that this approach cannot compete with petroleum. As I noted in my presentation, productivity in northern latitudes will make it even harder to compete on a straight biofuel production basis. The challenge for all will be to identify value-added co-products that are scalable with biofuels. Meeting that challenge is even greater for areas that are less than ideal for maximum productivity. There is a great deal of information in the literature regarding the toxicity of high concentrations of CO2 as well as the contaminating gases found in flue gas. Most of this work deals with enrichment cultures or small bench scale cultures grown from dilute inocula. Careful analysis of the body of work suggests that the problem was not the toxicity of the gas components, but rather, the acidic nature of CO2, NOx and SOx, but that is an unproven hypothesis. Therefore, to be certain that the strains isolated would be able to thrive with flue gas as a CO2 source, we planned our enrichments to isolate only strains that were robust enough to survive the challenge of simulated flue gas. As I noted, the enrichment cultures in well buffered media provided robust growth. This prompted us to modify our media formulation and the results support the hypothesis that the problem with flue gas is more a pH issue than a toxicity issue. 3.B. I agree that strain characterization is essential, and that has begun at NRC with the transfer of our current culture collection. The buffering was necessary for small scale enrichments and culture growth because pH control was not practical for the number of cultures being grown. But extensive buffering is not necessary for larger scale cultures. The pH shifts caused by CO2 dissolution can be used to control CO2 feeding using pH probes to control gas addition valves. This process is used to great success by our NRC colleagues. 3.C. See response 1.C. 3.D. The DOE algal biofuels roadmap Page 220 of 223
2011 Algae Platform Review – Reviewer Comments Reviewer Comments are direct transcripts of commentary and material provided by the Platform’s Review Panel. They have not been edited or altered by the Biomass Program. calls out the need for additional diversity in algal strains. The strains to be isolated in this project will add incrementally to that diversity. I am forced to agree that the scope of this project is currently too small to lead to any major advance, but the development of the strains that arise from this work whether by us or by other groups could lead to the identification of a robust production strain or to novel genes or pathways that could be exploited for production of biofuels or other industrial targets. 4. Critical Success Factors The project has identified critical factors, (including technical, business, market, regulatory, and legal factors) that impact the potential technical and commercial success of the project The project has presented adequate plans to recognize, address, and overcome these factors The project has the opportunity to advance the state of technology and impact the viability of commercial algal biomass feedstock supply and conversion, through one or more of the following: i. Cross-Cutting Analysis (ex. economic analysis, sustainability analysis, resource assessments, risk assessments) ii. Feedstock Supply R&D (ex. biology, cultivation, resource use, biomass characteristics, harvesting/dewatering) iii. Downstream Refining R&D (ex. extraction, conversion, fuel, products, fuel/product infrastructure and end-use) iv. Environmental sustainability (example: water use, GMOs, energy consumption) Reviewer Comments Reviewer: 1 Criteria Score: 1 There is no significant discussion of CSFs, only a general statement about commercialization of algal biofuels. Reviewer: 2 Criteria Score: 5 The proposed collaboration with wastewater experts at Univ. MN seems likely to improve final product. Reviewer: 3 Criteria Score: 5 Critical success factors for commercialization of algal biofuels span the value chain and include biological productivity, cultivation, harvest, extraction and conversion to fuel. This project is currently focused on biological productivity, namely growth and lipid content. Reviewer: 5 Criteria Score: 3 Critical success factors were identified but there seemed to be no plan how the most predictable obstacle (failure of strains to thrive in full-scale systems) would be overcome. Reviewer: 7 Criteria Score: 3 Climate is a critical success factor that cannot be addressed by this project. Presenter Response 4.A. Time constraints did not allow me to develop critical success factors further. 4.B. The entire partnership is in agreement that UM should be included in the collaboration. We are looking for a funding mechanism to add them to the team. 4C. This obstacle was addressed in Response 1.C. but I believe that its predictability is overstated, and the growing number of organizations scaling up cultivation of specific strains supports that belief. Page 221 of 223
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Reviewer Comments - EERE

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