Floating Robotic Algae Farms Looking for Investors

January 6, 2012
AlgaeIndustryMagazine.com

eremy Hsu at MSNBC reports on a new company called BEAR Oceanics developing small algal biofuel farms the size of bathtubs that would operate like fleets of robotic, self-contained, biofuel producers, floating in remote-controlled areas of the ocean. That vision aims for self-sustaining robot farms capable of steering clear of boats or ships and relying solely on wind and solar power to grow algae year-round.

The BEAR robotic farms are intended to turn algae sludge into five gallons of biofuel per day, employing a mild electric current to burst the algae cells to release lipid and the thermal depolymerization, using heat and pressure, to turn the algal oil into biodiesel. “And you haven’t used any chemicals, so you don’t have a toxic waste stream,” said Rudy Behrens, of BEAR Oceanics. “We can do this on a large scale without disrupting the food chain or creating a hazard.”

The Pennsylvania-based startup is looking for help from online do-gooders to build its first full-size robot farm. It recently posted a project on the crowd-funding website Kickstarter to ask for donations. “I meant this to be a human-scale technology that people could do either as a part-time effort, or as a small business or as a major business,” Behrens told InnovationNewsDaily. “It’s meant to be economically viable at a very small scale, but you can scale it up as much as you like.”