14 DAY TRIAL // Following the success registered by the opening of their first commercial scale algae biodiesel factory in the United States, PetroSun has recently made a deal with a Chinese firm in order to help it build a similar plant in their country.
Shanghai Jun Ya Yan Technology Development Company has reached an agreement with PetroSun which implies that the latter provides expertise and technology in order to help the Chinese company build an algae farming facility in China in exchange of $40 million. As stipulated, the profits will be split equally between the two. A recent press release informs that “other commercial products” will be developed from algae, besides biodiesel and ethanol. Related suppositions associate the expression to supplements for livestock food produced from algae remains after having been squashed out of oil and transformed into ethanol, but no one knows for sure.
The microalgae (also known as phytoplankton, planktonic algae, or microphytes) are generally cultivated for the development of fuel, pharmaceuticals, bio-plastics, feedstock, pollution control, dyes and colorants, or for attempts of creating future food sources. Related to its fueling potential, the phytoplankton has drawn much attention as of late because a square acre (0.0015 square miles or 0.0040 square kilometers) of microalgae is able to yield 30 to 100 times the amount of oil extracted from soybeans, while the remains can also be used for obtaining some of the many products mentioned earlier. PetroSun has managed to overcome the major issues of algae collecting and pressing, as well as that of foreign species invasions and contaminations in cases of open ponds, either based on “a superior technological approach” or “a redneck can-do attitude,” as the CEO of PetroSun, Gordon LeBlanc states. The company's technology, approach and attitude will much help the Chinese in their endeavor.