By Les Blumenthal

WASHINGTON - A 75-gallon tank of goo was one of the stars of last summer’s Farnborough International Air Show in England.

As airlines ordered hundreds of planes worth billions of dollars at the world’s largest air show, the tank, or
bioreactor, was a near-perfect breeding ground for what could become the fuel of the future: the lowly algae.

Aerospace companies and airlines are betting that algae — simple organisms that come in some 30,000 species,
many of which can be genetically modified — will prove
to be a green fuel that can power jet planes. Algae also could be blended into diesel and gasoline, and perhaps could even replace petroleum-based diesel and gasoline one day.

As the infant industry organizes, algae must make their case for the kinds of tax breaks, market incentives, loans, and research and development backing that other biofuel sectors have. Though corn and soybean growers long have lobbied in Washington, the Algal Biomass Organization is a new kid on the block.

The organization is meeting in the nation’s capital today to discuss how to convince Congress and the incoming Obama administration that algae are much more than the film inside your fish tank, the scum blooming in the neighborhood pond or, in one of their most complex forms, seaweed.

“We are up against formidable opposition from competing interests,” Jason Pyle, the chief executive of Sapphire Energy, said of resistance from ethanol and biodiesel groups during an algae industry meeting in Seattle earlier this fall.

Sapphire, a San Diego company, already has made a type of
gasoline using algae that meets fuel quality standards, is
compatible with current gasoline-manufacturing infrastructure
and achieved a 91 octane rating.

Pyle said that current policy favored such alternative fuels as
corn for ethanol or soybeans for biodiesel and provided only
limited assistance to algae-related products. He said that one
of the top priorities for the new Congress and the Obama
administration in their first 100 days would be to write a
comprehensive energy bill. Pyle said it was crucial that the
algae industry make its presence known.

“The train is moving … it hasn’t left the station yet,” Pyle
said in urging the algae industry to make a concerted lobbying
effort. “But we are approaching the final opportunity … to
grab a seat on the energy train.”

In addition to algae, biofuel researchers have looked at
jatropha — a bush that grows in arid environments, needs little
water and yields more oil than corn — and halophytes,
salt-tolerant plants such as seashore mallow.

Virgin Atlantic — which is a member of the Seattle-based Algal
Biomass Organization along with Boeing, Air New Zealand and
Continental Airlines — successfully tested a green aviation
fuel based on jatropha on a 747 flight from London to
Amsterdam. Air New Zealand plans a similar test.

Though jatropha has attracted a lot of attention, Darrin
Morgan, who heads Boeing’s effort to develop biofuels and is
one of the Algal Biomass Organization’s chairmen, said algae
might be the best bet in the long run.

If algae-based fuel can be certified for commercial use and
large enough quantities can be produced, Morgan said, it’s
realistic that it would be used in commercial aviation in three
to five years.

“It would be possible to fly on 100 percent (algae), but most
likely it will be a blend,” he said.

The Department of Energy studied algae as a fuel source as far
back as the 1970s but abandoned the research in 1996 to focus
on ethanol. Last year’s energy bill required the department to
report to Congress on the feasibility of algae as a biofuel.

NASA has been looking at algae as a jet fuel and for other uses
in outer space.

“It’s hard not to get excited about algae’s potential,” said
Paul Dickerson, the chief operating officer of the Energy
Department’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

While most of the interest in developing algae farms has
focused on southern California and Arizona, where it’s sunny,
or near coal-fired generating plants, where carbon dioxide
emissions could be used as plant food, it’s possible to grow
algae anywhere. They can flourish in salt water, fresh water,
brackish water or wastewater.