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Healthy Home Economist / Archives / Green Living / Cars Powered by … Algae?

Cars Powered by … Algae?

by Sarah Pope / Affiliate Links ✔

Green Algae on BeachI love to read stories about creative people coming up with new, amazingly innovative ideas that improve the modern standard of living but also where the manufacturing process is kind to the environment and utilizes renewable resources.

One area today that requires serious innovation is the area of battery production.  Not only do today’s lithium-ion batteries come from limited, non-renewable resources, they present disposal challenges as acid leakage from used batteries threatens to pollute the environment.

Enter Maria Stromme.

Maria Stromme, Professor of Nanotechnology at Uppsala University in Sweden is experimenting with making batteries that have electrodes made from none other than algae cellulose!

The first generation of  algae battery production has been encouraging as they are very cheap to manufacture and environmentally friendly.

Unfortunately, these renewable algae batteries are not very powerful.    Dr. Stromme’s research team is working to change that by increasing the energy density while also keeping the structure of the algae batteries simple and made of renewable materials.

Another goal is to ensure the manufacturing process for the algae batteries doesn’t require much energy so production from start to finish is as green as possible.

Could the polluting lithium-ion batteries of today be completely replaced one day with non-polluting, renewable algae batteries strong enough to power an automobile?

Dr. Stromme’s research team thinks so.

Let’s hope she’s right!

If the manufacturing uses of plant cellulose is interesting to you, check out another story I wrote about cellulose from kombucha cultures being used in the fashion industry for making clothing!

Sarah, TheHealthyHomeEconomist.com

Source: FastCompany, Battery Power, September 2011

Picture Credit

 

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Category: Green Living
Sarah Pope

Sarah Pope MGA has been a Health and Nutrition Educator since 2002. She is a summa cum laude graduate in Economics from Furman University and holds a Master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania.

She is the author of three books: the bestseller Get Your Fats Straight, Traditional Remedies for Modern Families, and Living Green in an Artificial World.

Her four eBooks Good Diet…Bad Diet, Real Food Fermentation, Ketonomics, and Ancestrally Inspired Dairy-Free Recipes are available for complimentary download via Healthy Home Plus.

Her mission is dedicated to helping families effectively incorporate the principles of ancestral diets within the modern household. She is a sought after lecturer around the world for conferences, summits, and podcasts.

Sarah was awarded Activist of the Year in 2010 at the International Wise Traditions Conference, subsequently serving on the Board of Directors of the nutrition nonprofit the Weston A. Price Foundation for seven years.

Her work has been covered by numerous independent and major media including USA Today, ABC, and NBC among many others.

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Reader Interactions

Comments (9)

  1. Algae Biofuel

    Jan 4, 2012 at 6:00 am

    Algae biofuel is a great way to save a substantial amount of money on your diesel fuel costs. Not forgetting you can also save big on your heating cost if you live in colder areas. The basic aspect of algae biofuel is to transform algal oil into biodiesel, a fuel source that can be used in your diesel engine powered vehicles.

    Reply
  2. susan v.

    Oct 2, 2011 at 7:19 pm

    very interesting! i sure appreciate the range of topics you blog about!

    Reply
  3. Joseph Burk via Facebook

    Oct 1, 2011 at 12:30 am

    That would be so cool!

    Reply
  4. tina

    Sep 30, 2011 at 11:53 am

    I may be the only one who thinks it’s stupid to use algae to power cars. We’d use it so fast, it wouldn’t have time to reproduce.

    Reply
    • D.

      Sep 30, 2011 at 12:14 pm

      Tina, algae is being reproduced in labs around the world. This is not a new phenomenon, this has been in the works for more than a decade already. I read about it several years ago. It is classified as biodiesel fuel, or it was at the time I first read about it, so the uses would be limited. Hopefully technology will, or has been able to perfect it a bit more so its uses will be more diversified.

  5. thehealthyhomeeconomist via Facebook

    Sep 30, 2011 at 10:48 am

    @Pam, I posted a story about kombucha cellulose being used to make clothes a month or so ago. The link is at the bottom of the cars powered by algae post.

    Reply
  6. Pam Howe via Facebook

    Sep 30, 2011 at 10:11 am

    You know the kombucha “mushroom” is cellulose. Wonder if the good professor has played with that yet?

    Reply
  7. The Economics Smiley (@TheEconSmiley) (@TheEconSmiley)

    Sep 30, 2011 at 10:06 am

    Cars Powered by … Algae? – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/AzztcbmJ http://t.co/KF4gGEtC #economics #econ

    Reply
  8. HealthyHomeEconomist (@HealthyHomeEcon) (@HealthyHomeEcon) (@HealthyHomeEcon) (@HealthyHomeEcon) (@HealthyHomeEcon)

    Sep 30, 2011 at 9:57 am

    Cars Powered by … Algae? – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/od1WG2PQ

    Reply

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