Muradel plant produces crude oil from algae

Renewable fuels company Muradel has opened Australia’s first integrated demonstration plant to sustainably convert algae into green crude. The $10.7 million plant, based at Whyalla, South Australia, will produce 30,000 litres of green crude a year using Muradel’s Green2Black technology.

Using microalgae produced on-site, plant biomass and organic waste, Muradel’s energy-efficient subcritical water reactor converts them in minutes to a crude oil that is functionally equivalent to fossil crude. Standard oil refining goes on to produce cost-comparable, low-net carbon, liquid transport fuels including petrol, diesel and aviation fuels. The resilient strain of microalgae, which has proven productive all year in Australia’s sunny conditions, is sustainably grown in seawater ponds on marginal land that doesn’t compete with food production.

The plant was opened by SA Regional Development Minister Geoff Brock and Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) CFO Ian Kay. ARENA committed $4.4 million in funding to encourage a viable, sustainable alternative to fossil oil and to biofuels currently produced from food crops; Kay noted that Muradel is poised to offer the technology commercially, “with the ambition of making it available as a renewable alternative at the pump”.

Muradel CEO and University of Adelaide Associate Professor David Lewis said if the demonstration plant was successfully scaled to a commercial plant, it would produce 500,000 barrels of refinable green crude a year by 2019, providing enough petrol and diesel to fuel 30,000 vehicles for a year. Production costs would be on par with the cost of producing fossil fuels for transport, and a 1000-hectare commercial plant would create at least 100 new skilled and operational jobs in the Whyalla region.

“This is world-leading technology which can be scaled up exponentially to help steer our fossil fuel-dependent economy to a more sustainable future,” Dr Lewis said.

“Not only will the plant be a boon for the region’s economy, the algae ponds will act as carbon sinks that can capture greenhouse gas emissions produced by Whyalla’s heavy industry.”

Muradel will next month commence talks with downstream oil processors about refining and distributing its crude as transport fuel for shipping, aviation and road vehicles.