/sci/ - Science & Math

>Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory pumped a slurry of wet algae into a chemical reactor, which then subjects the biological material to very hot water under high pressure to tear it apart and convert it into liquid and gas fuels.

>The resulting crude oil can then be conventionally refined into aviation fuel, gasoline or diesel fuel, the researchers reported in the journal Algal Research.

>The team’s experiments converted more than 50 percent of the algae’s carbon into crude oil, sometimes up to 70 percent, in about one hour and created nothing more hazardous than an odor of dirty socks, rotten eggs and wood smoke from the processed biological material.

>The process works an algae slurry that contains up to 90 percent water, unlike most current processes that used dried algae, and cuts costs significantly by eliminating the need for time and energy used to dry out the biomaterial.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/18/scientists-cut-million-year-natural-process-to-convert-algae-into-crude-oil-to-about-an-hour/