Life Cycle Analysis of Algae Biodiesel

LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS OF ALGAE BIODIESEL
-Siddhant Singhal 2018A4PS0009P
Introduction
Out of a lot of alternative fuels available to us, algae biomass has shown great promise as a
sustainable alternative to conventional transportation fuels. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a useful
technique that can be performed to investigate the overall sustainability and net energy balance of
an algal biodiesel process and hence in this study, an analysis using the above methodology is done.
Life-Cycle Assessment is an objective procedure used to evaluate the environmental impacts

associated with a product’s entire life cycle. It is done through the quantitative determination of all
exchange flows between the product, system and the ecosphere in all the transformation processes
involved, from obtaining of materials to their end for this product.
Generally LCA has four stages or components:

1. Goal and scope
2. Inventory Analysis
3. Impact Assessment
4. Interpretation and Results
Goal and Scope

The goal of this LCA is to establish baseline information for algal biodiesel process and assess
sustainability of algae biodiesel by characterizing energy use and emissions.
In this process, the influence of water types, operation with and without recycling, algal species and
geographic distributions are analysed.
Inventory Analysis
The life-cycle of the microalgae biodiesel production system includes the processes of culture,
harvest, drying, extraction, and esterification. First, together with added nutrients, culture water
(freshwater, seawater or wastewater) is fed to an open pond. During the culture process, freshwater
is added regularly to compensate water loss and avoid salt build-up due to evaporation, i.e. a certain
amount of freshwater has to be consumed in the production of microalgae biodiesel no matter what
type of culture water is used. Microalgae are harvested when the biomass and lipid content reached
certain levels. After harvest, the culture water can be partially recycled by pumping it back into the
culture pond. The remaining water is discharged directly into wastewater treatment system. Algae
are then dried. Finally, lipid is extracted from the concentrated (wet or dry) microalgae and
esterified to produce biodiesel.
1. Culture During the culture process, water is lost primarily owing to evaporation. In this study, lake
evaporation rate is used to approximate the evaporation rate in open ponds based on methods
reported by Farnsworth and Thompson (1982). In addition, temperature and solar radiation data
which affects micro algal growth rate and lipid accumulation were obtained from the national solar
radiation database (NSRDB). Micro algal lipid content is cited from the research of Hu et al. (2008)
and Chisti (2008). The addition of nutrients is calculated based on their concentration in ponds.
2. Harvesting and drying Harvesting, the process of collecting algal cells from dilute suspension
culture, is characterized by the solid content and recovery rate. Solid content is the mass ratio of
microalgae to water after harvesting, whereas the recovery rate refers to the ratio of the harvested
microalgae mass to the microalgae mass after culture. Similarly, drying is a further dewatering
process that is also characterized by solid content and recovery rate. In general, the solid content
after harvest can easily exceed 90%, while the recovery rate can reach 95%.
3. Extraction and esterification The extraction and esterification process for microalgae biodiesel
production is similar to that of producing soybean biodiesel when the slurry content is greater than
90%. Thus, this study applies the average water usage in extraction and esterification of soybean
biodiesel production to approximate that of producing microalgae biodiesel, i.e., 2–10 l of water
usage per litre of biodiesel. Note that not all the harvested microalgae can be converted into
biodiesel. In particular, the yield for C. vulgaris extraction is approximately 70%. Chemical
methanolysis using an alkali catalysis process is then used for esterification with a yield that can
exceed 96%.
Impact Assessment
A case of culturing C. vulgaris in an open pond under the conditions similar to the summer in
California is studied to examine the water footprint and life-cycle nutrients consumption of
microalgae-based biodiesel production.
1. Water usage Without recycling harvested water, the water footprint is approximately 3726 kg-
water/kg-biodiesel. About 84.1% of the water is discharged after harvest, while the rest is lost by
either pond evaporation or drying. The water footprint can be reduced to as low as 591 kg-water/kg-
biodiesel if all the harvest water is recycled. The water usage of culture, drying, extraction or
esterification does not vary with the change of the harvest water recycling rate. In other words, no
matter how much harvest water is recycled, the water footprint caused by other processes, mostly
culture and drying, is generally unavoidable. In addition to freshwater, seawater, and wastewater
can also be utilized for algal culture. In particular, wastewater refers to secondary effluents
characterized with low biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) but
high inorganic nitrogen and phosphorous. The results indicate that using seawater or wastewater
can reduce the life-cycle freshwater usage by as much as 90%. However, a significant amount of
freshwater must be used for culture no matter whether sea/ wastewater serve as the culture
medium or how much harvested water is recycled.
2. Nutrient usage Not surprisingly, harvested water recycling can significantly reduce the nutrient
usage. In particular, the life-cycle usages of nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium, magnesium, and
sulphur are 0.33, 0.71, 0.58, 0.27, and 0.15 kg/kg-biodiesel without harvest water recycling.
However, when the harvest water is 100% recycled, the usage of these nutrients decreases by
approximately 55%. Using sea/wastewater for algal culture can reduce nitrogen usage by 94% and
eliminate the need of potassium, magnesium, and sulphur. Overall, nutrient usage increases as the
recycling rate of harvested water decreases.
3. Sensitivity analysis Sensitivity analysis is conducted to understand how parameter variations

affect the results and to identify parameters that are critical for quantifying the water footprint of
microalgae biodiesel production. Parameters analyzed in this study include evaporation rate, algal
growth rate, algal lipid content, slurry content after harvesting, recovery rate after harvesting and
slurry content after drying. Evaporation rate, algal growth rate, algal lipid content, and slurry content
after harvest are the most sensitive parameters. Furthermore, by combining the variations of these
parameters from literature, it can be found that growth rate is the most sensitive factor.There are
also uncertainties from the sources of data, mostly the literature cited in this research. Given that
some of these studies do not report uncertainties associated with their data sources in detail, it is
difficult to comprehensively quantify this type of uncertainties in this research. However, using
existing information from the literature, we found the differences between life-cycle stages are more
significant than the deviations caused by uncertainties from data sources. While a careful
examination may be necessary in the future for other purposes, for this research a detailed analysis
of uncertainties associated with data sources is less important.
Interpretation and Results

This study quantifies the water footprint and nutrients usages during microalgae biodiesel
production. 3726 kg water, 0.33 kg nitrogen, and 0.71 kg phosphate are required to generate 1 kg
microalgae biodiesel if freshwater is used without recycling. Recycling harvest water reduces the
water and nutrients usage by 84% and 55%, respectively. Using sea/wastewater as culture medium
decreases 90% water requirement, and eliminates the need of all the nutrients except phosphate.
Geographic and species variation are discussed to identify the potential species and locations for
microalgae biodiesel production. Aimed at current renewable energy programs, the implementation
pathways and the potential bottlenecks are suggested.

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LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS OF ALGAE BIODIESEL

-Siddhant Singhal 2018A4PS0009P

Life-Cycle Assessment is an objective procedure used to evaluate the environmental impacts

Generally LCA has four stages or components:

Goal and Scope

3. Sensitivity analysis Sensitivity analysis is conducted to understand how parameter variations

Interpretation and Results

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