Micro-algae cultivation and algae-oil fuel production by enrich CO₂ introduction from diesel co-generation system

Abstract

The tri-generation system is the high efficiency of the system which utilizes not only the electricity and heat from an engine co-generation system, but also CO₂ in the exhaust gas as a resource for growing plants or micro-algae. In our previous study, we demonstrate the mass production of algal-oil at enriched CO₂ aeration under the sunlight condition. In this study, we collected CO₂ in the diesel engine exhaust of co-generation system and introduced the enriched CO₂ aeration in cultivation of microalgae, Scenedesmus dimorphus, in photo bioreactors. In addition, fuel property of the oil extracted and treated by the super-heated methanol vapor method was analyzed. From the experimental result, it was shown that the aeration of enriched CO₂ of diesel engine exhaust is effective to increase algal cell density, and fuel property of FAME produced from microalgae is improved by the super-heated methanol vapor method. Also, it was estimated that the super-heated methanol vapor method is effective to reduce the energy consumption for fuel production.