ExxonMobil Bets $600 Million on Algae

$300 M investment $300 M to advertise it !!!!!!!!!!

"Will [ExxonMobil] spend the same amount of money advertising this investment as the investment itself? Are they investing in any truly 'green' technology such as wind or solar? The jury is out," Madill told CNN.

thanks 1Eco_Media.

http://current.com/items/90468129_friends-of-the-earth-gets-this-deal-in-spades....

That is quite true 1Eco-Media.

However, it will not be easy for BM( Big Money) to monopolize biofuels much longer. There is no way presently to monopolize the sources like there is with oil and gas---even XM could not get rights to all the plant sources in the world. What they have been doing in the past is spreading lies about biofuels in an effort to keep them off the market.

1) Ethanol will destroy your cars engine.

That would be news to the Indy League racing circuit---these are the fastest, most advanced race cars in the world. They all run on 100% ethanol. Indy League race cars typically develope 1200 to 1600 hp. from 3L Honda V8 engines---that is about the same size or smaller than most passenger cars on the road today---yet more hp than 3-4 typical 18 wheel over the road diesel rigs. This is only possble because ethanol has an octane rating of 115~120 vs. 85-87 for gasoline. And it is nothing new---Indy race cars have used alcohol fuels for over 40 years. Ethanol can drive race cars at 240 mph, it can drive you family car at 60 mph with no sweat.

2) Ethanol from cellulose is still years away.

We have able to make ethanol from cellulose for over 100 years. It was being done in both Germany and the US in the 1890s. Commercial quantities.

3) Biofuels are not commercially viable.

People buy what costs less. We've past peak oil. Oil will only get more and more expensive as it gets harder and harder to find, get to, get out, transport and refine. The only thing that not preparing to use biofuels guarrantees is that we will be locked in to using oil that is only going to get more and more expensive. Economic recovery needs energy to drive it----there will be no economic recovery if we rely on oil to provide it.

Algae is for real folks. And Exxon/Mobil's partnership with Synthetic Genomics is just the latest in a number of moves by Big Oil to get in on the ground floor of an emerging market. It's estimated that by the end of 2012, more than a dozen pilot algae programs will enter the first stage of the commercial market. As for those scoffing at the percentage of their profits being used, $600 million dollars for furthering research and development is nothing to sneeze at. And, if it helps solve the problems preventing large scale production of algae as an alternative energy, then I think I can look past the perceived greenwashing (the ends justify the means)

I know ExxonMobil is the Great Satan of environmentalists the world over, but they have a lot of smart people working for them and seeing the future of alternative energy doesn't take a lot of intelligence...their investment in what they deemed the best of the bunch shouldn't have been hard to predict.

600 million? their toilets cost more then that. i worked for philips oil in the late 70's, i helped drill 20 wells in west idaho for geothermal energy. each hole cost a half million 70's dollars and have been capped off all this time waiting for fossil fuels to run out.
the oil companies are very well prepared for the future, they already know exactly what they are going to do.

------"Exxon knows the cookie jar they have had their hands in for the past 150 yrs is about to be depleted."--------

XM is in a position to know more about what is inside the cookie jar than anyone else on earth. They own more of the cookie jar than anyone else on earth. They can peek inside. XM wants you to buy cookies from them. XM does not want you to know how many cookies are left in the jar.

We've been using cookies out of the jar for 150 years this year(since 1859). In all that time, no one has EVER baked one new cookie. There has never been one drop of new oil produced---"producing" oil means using up the cookies faster.

Valcent products is building a pilot size facility to test the commercial viability of their modular product to raise algae in closed loop systems. These modules can be installed and used anywhere at all----they are like a fish tank optimized to grow algae instead of fish. Sort of like a bread making machine to make new oil----a cookie baking machine.

http://www.valcent.net/s/Home.asp

http://www.valcent.net/s/Ecotech.asp?ReportID=182039

http://www.valcent.net/s/Ecotech.asp?ReportID=183148

You can buy 1,000 shares of stock in Valcent products for $38.00 right now. That is a whole lot less than you'd pay to buy 1,000 lottery tickets. I think the odds of winning big time are also a whole lot better.

PetroSun is another company that is investing in growing algae in open ponds. PetroSun commenced operations on a 1200 acre facility in Rio Hondo TX in April of 2008, to produce 4.4 million gallons of algae oil per year.

http://www.petrosuninc.com/

PetroSun has just signed an agreement with the town of Gilbert AZ to investigate producing algae using sewage waste water as a nutrient source to grow algae, treat the sewage and produce oil---all in one operation.

PetroSun stock sells for less than $.07 per share right now. You can buy 1,000 shares for $ 66.

As long as they are not allowed to patent algae or patent the system of making fuel from algae, go ahead. Otherwise its like Monsanto patenting any farm crop that mixes with their bio engineering, thus owning all rights to all food.

Thats so sweet...lets all forget about any oil spills. They are in in it to help out the environment and not for the money! I am totally buying their fuel.

PS it is also a GOOD sorce of food.

Neocongo alge oil is better in Rudolph's engin and dead on the 0 net co2 gain thing

R & D ?? I'll show em for free how to use co2 to produce fuel & oil using alge..........but I'll hold of and see what this all amounts too

It's a market and becoming more viable everyday, I think Exxon is in business to make money and when alternative fuels become the largest share of the market I bet they want a piece of the action especially when the tide has turned and they still have the money from their record profits to get in deep early.

opps sorry I am dick.

If you think we are out of oil your wrong. Most wells only produce about 25% of the oil in the ground, before you have to start pumping the oil. Natural gases make the oil come out all by itself in the middle east. When an oil well stops pumping by itself, they cap it. So we are maybe at 50 % in the US, but along way to go in the middle east. If we had say.....25 % of our cars were EV, oil would drop like a rock. When we go to 50% EV in the USA the middle east will set itself on fire. Unless China saves them.

Yeah!!!! they invested 2.5% of one quarters profit into something they might develop an patent just to suppress form the public so they can sell us more overpriced gas...

The first time I seen this was from RED HAWK turbine that used the C02 from the turbine (small) to fast grow it in tubes, then fac it to make fuels. Aslo heavy oils. But what do I know Im a dick.

---------"As long as they can make a profit off of it they will be happy. "---------

Personally, I think it has much more to do with insuring their monopoly status to guard the profits they already have coming in than it does with anything else.

I think they are looking for ways to continue to keep biofuels off the market, or marginalized to the point that they still come up with a plum on their thumb every time they stick it in the pie.

----------"$600M is kind of pocket change to Exxon Mobil isn't it?"---------

[decimal point].75% of net profits for last year alone.

Exxon Mobil had net(amount left after ALL expenses were paid) profits of $40.6 Billion in 2007, and $45.2 Billion for 2008

$600M is kind of pocket change to Exxon Mobil isn't it?

------"Do you think Exxon Mobil is interested in renewable sources of energy, or is this just a way to placate critics? "---------

No, XM is only interested in continuing their monopoly status. The only green that XM is interested in, is in your pocket.

from the SA article------""We want to produce hydrocarbons that look like today's refinery products, that can go into a refinery to be processed along with other petroleum streams and then used in the transportation fleet or even jet fuel. And we think we've got a good chance of doing that."------------

Why make "biofuels" that need to be refined? Biofuels do not need to be refined.

We already have naturally occurring algae that produce as much as 50% lipids----why do we need a GMO that produces crude oil that needs to be refined? Plant lipids need no refining to be used in diesel engines.

Biofuels are naturally biodegradable in the environment. Petroleum is not. Why use plant sources to make synthetic petroleum which when spilled will destroy the environment, when biofuels can do the same things that petroleum can, and are far less damaging if released into the environment.

From the great people who brought you Exxon Valdez----then hired an army of lawyers to work for twenty years and finally managed to get payments for clean up--damages--and fines reduced to a mere pittance.

-------"Exxon Mobil launched the partnership after years of being publicly opposed to investing in renewable energy. Privately, though, Jacobs said the company has been investigating the sector for years.

"It's fair to say that we looked at all the biofuels options," Jacobs said. "Algae ended up on top."--------

Translation: We are getting really worried. We have hundreds of scientists and PR people on board who can't find anything to attack about algae that people won't figure out in 30 seconds that it is lies and WE are really the enemy. So, we are spending over 1/2 a billion dollars for an outside company to look at all the processes that are currently being used so that we can figure out ways to wreck the competition---if we can't find anything wrong with algae---we'll look for weak points in the production and processing chain and use those to put our competition out of business.

--------"They added that they were likewise uncertain what end-product fuels would result from the collaboration."[ Jacobs and Venter XM]----------

None. They are already making barrels of money with petroleum---why would they want to produce anything else? There is only one thing we know for sure, oil is finite and oil will run out. Sounds to me like they are hedging bets for the day when petroleum runs out. On paper, XM owns rights to more petroleum reserves than anyone else in the world. Maybe there is something they are not telling everyone. Oil companies are valued according to the reserves they own rights to. If they admit that reserves are way over estimated or non existant----the value of the company stocks will plummet. The value of the stocks will remain high if you convince everyone that there is plenty of oil for a long time to come. In the meantime---it is more profitable to keep selling petroleum like there is no tomorrow, until the last drop is pumped out of the ground.

Oil started under John D. Rockefeller---who was the King Pirate of the robber barrons. JD was renowned for his cut throat business practices and shady dealing. Nothing has changed----oil is still a cartel monopoly.

Predatory wolves don't suddenly start eating grass and turn green---unless they are stalking the prey.

Does it really matter? Either way, they're investing $600 million into "clean" energy.

The biggest positive of this, in my mind, is that if this works, the abomination that is corn-based ethanol will end. Using food for fuel had to be the dumbest idea to ever get so much money invested into it.

There are already systems that use algea to scrub CO2 out of coal plant emmisions.

If they can find a way to efficiently remove co2 from the air, and then sell it back to us. They look like the good guys, AND make a fortune.

They could probably charge carbon credits to coal plants to clean up their emmisions. (and make a fortune on that too. Genius!!!

Hmm, probably both. Exxon probably realizes that they legitimately need to be looking for greener ways to fuel the country. Although I wouldn't be surprised at all if this was just for show.

It took the Federal government and your tax dollars to build aproximately 600 dams, including Hoover Dam, nearly all of which generate electricity. Their failure rate, for you anti-government types, is 1 dam failure over 50 years. One dam failed when it was first filled. A phenomental record. Tests done regularly indicate the dams have become stronger over time. As the concrete is slowly saturated, it re-crystallizes in a much stronger form.

It is going to take a similar massive government effort to create wind and solar power because Corporate America just ain't up to the task.

Another way to get ethanol, correct? Looks to me as though the Exxon is trying to look green while continuing bidness as usual.

While algae uses the same amount of carbon that is given off from burning the ethanol it creates, we need much better. Electric cars powered by clean electricity. This algae solution will help level CO2 output from the auto industry over a long period of time but it is no solution to all the other coal burning industries pumping out massive amounts of carbon.

A coal train aproximately a mile long passes through my town every 15 minutes, taking coal east to factories. It is staggering. Algae ethanol ain't gonna cut it, and Exxon couldn't care less.