Alternative fuels from Seaweed
SeaH4 / Johannes Bochdalofsky
Ocean going ships will rely on the combustion engine for decades to come. Even with low- or no-carbon fuels slowly emerging, vessels being put into service today have a 30year life span. Currently emitting 1GT of CO2e annually.
Broadly accepted is that biofuels and LNG can bridge the gap the fastest at the required scale. But the world is lacking sustainable feedstock for biofuel production (without impacting food production or cutting down forests). SeaH4 will farm a fast growing seaweed in ponds (on land) along desert shores - without detrimental impacts on valuable habitats or arable land, which can then be turned into biogas. Biogas in turn can be upgraded into bioLNG (carbon neutral) and biogenic CO2, which, together with the African emerging green hydrogen industry, can produce carbon neutral e-fuels (e-methanol or sustainable aviation fuels). Note that the biogenic CO2 was removed by the seaweed from the ocean, reducing its acidification.