An Investigation on the economic feasibility of macroalgae as a potential feedstock for Biorefineries
Open accessAbstract
Macroalgal biomass has been considered as a prospective feedstock for biofuel production as, among other benefits, it is an abundant source of renewable sugars and its growth does not require arable land, fresh water, or intense care. Successful commercial deployment of macroalgae-based biorefineries, however, depends on their economic viability at industrial scales. A key objective of this study was to carry out a detailed technoeoconomic analysis (TEA) of a macroalgae biorefinery to understand the economic potential and cost drivers of macroalgae as a feedstock for the production of biofuels and biochemicals. Ethanol was used as a representative macroalgae-derived product, given the wealth of public information available to model this option, and the analysis was extended to biomass-derived sugars in order to explore the production of other fermentation-derived chemicals. Sensitivity analysis was performed on various cost drivers, such as macroalgae price, yield, solids loading, and enzyme loading during hydrolysis. With a feedstock price of $100/MT, depending on the maturity of the other key process parameters (i.e., yield, solids loading, and enzyme loading), the minimum ethanol selling price (MESP) was observed to be in the range of $3.6–8.5/gal and reduced to $2.9–7.5/gal with macroalgae priced at $50/MT. For production of chemicals, sugar prices were in the range of ¢21–47/lb or ¢16–40/lb with macroalgae priced at $100/MT and $50/MT, respectively. Given the challenging economics of the macroalgae biorefinery, coproduction of alginate was used to show the importance of multiple revenue sources, though issues regarding market saturation continue to arise when dealing with products of disparate market sizes.
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High-pressure technology pretreatment and PSSF show great potential for bioethanol production from macroalgae and may become available and suitable for commercial utilization.
“Therefore, the high-pressure technology pretreatment and PSSF shows great potential for bioethanol production from macroalgae and may become available and suitable for commercial utilization (Konda et al., 2015; Tan et al., 2020).”
From High-pressure technology for Sargassum spp biomass pretreatment and fractionation in the third generation of bioethanol production (2021) · cites this paper as Konda et al., 2015
The Sensitivity Analysis (page unavailable) says macroalgae-based ethanol could become economically viable only with multiple, concerted advances. It does not identify high-pressure pretreatment or PSSF as promising routes; the Macroalgae-to-Ethanol Biorefinery Configuration (page unavailable) explicitly depicts a process without pretreatment. Thus the general possibility of future commercial viability is supported, but the claim about these specific technologies is not. (LLM, conf=0.88)
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- Authors
- Konda, N. V. S. N. M., Singh, S., Simmons, B. A., & Klein-Marcuschamer, D.
- Affiliations
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (US)
- Sandia National Laboratories California (US)
- Venue
- BioEnergy Research
- Published
- 2015-03-06
- Volume
- 8
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 1046-1056
- ISSN
- 1939-1234 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1242
- OpenAlex
- W2107068693
- Cited by
- 110
- References
- 30
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 13 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 18 · 2021: 13 · 2020: 17 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 6 · 2015: 1
- FWCI
- 3.98
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- BioEnergy Research (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- U.S. Department of Energy (-AC02-05CH11231, 05CH11231, DE AC02 05CH11231, DE-AC02-)
- Office of Science (DEAC02–05CH11231, AC02-05CH11231, DE-AC02)
- Biological and Environmental Research (05CH11231, DE-AC02 − 05CH11231, AC02-05CH11231)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Biofuel production and bioconversion
- Physical Sciences › Energy › Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment › Algal biology and biofuel production
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › General Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Bioeconomy and Sustainability Development
- Keywords
- seaweed, biorefinery, economic feasibility, ethanol production, biomass-derived sugars, biochemicals, minimum ethanol selling price, solid loading, feedstock prices, techno-economic analysis, biofuels
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