Much of the discourse in the industrial gases business focuses on hydrogen and LNG as potentially alternative fuels of the future, and rightly so. But what of the biofuels?
The need for energy diversification is well established – fossil fuels are depleting and the quest is on for the array of alternative energy sources that will comprise our future.
Biomass and biofuels represent one such route, and steady progress has been made in the development of the first and second generation biofuels that may begin life as either wheat, fruit pulp or even plant stems. Augmenting this could be a so-called ‘next generation’ biofuel derived from algae.
Exxon Mobil Corporation has joined forces with a leading biotechnology research company to realise the potential of developing this next generation biofuel from photosynthetic algae. The company, the largest publicly traded international oil and gas firm, announced its pioneering alliance with Synthetic Genomics Inc. (SGI) in July 2009 and alluded to the prospects that exist as far as algae is concerned.
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