Novel approaches of producing bioenergies from microalgae: A recent review

Tan CH 1 , Show PL 2 , Chang JS 3 , Ling TC 4 , Lan JC 5

Affiliations 

  • 1 Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus, Jalan Broga, Semenyih, Selangor Darul Ehsan 43500, Malaysia
  • 2 Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus, Jalan Broga, Semenyih, Selangor Darul Ehsan 43500, Malaysia; Manufacturing and Industrial Processes Division, Faculty of Engineering, Centre for Food and Bioproduct Processing, University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus, Jalan Broga, Semenyih, Selangor Darul Ehsan 43500, Malaysia
  • 3 University Center for Bioscience and Biotechnology, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan; Department of Chemical Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan; Research Center for Energy Technology and Strategy, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan
  • 4 Institute of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur 50603, Malaysia
  • 5 Biorefinery and Bioprocess Engineering Laboratory, Department of Chemical Engineering and Material Science, Yuan Ze University, No. 135 Yuan-Tung Road, Chungli, Taoyuan 320, Taiwan. Electronic address: [email protected]
Biotechnol Adv, 2015 Nov 1;33(6 Pt 2):1219-27.
PMID: 25728066 DOI: 10.1016/j.biotechadv.2015.02.013

Abstract

Microalgae have caught the world's attention for its potential to solve one of the world's most pressing issues-sustainable green energy. Compared to biofuels supplied by oil palm, rapeseed, soybean and sugar cane, microalgae alone can be manipulated to generate larger amounts of biodiesel, bioethanol, biohydrogen and biomass in a shorter time. Apart from higher productivity, microalgae can also grow using brackish water on non-arable land, greatly reducing the competition with food and cash crops. Hence, numerous efforts have been put into the commercialisation of microalgae-derived biofuel by both the government and private bodies. This paper serves to review conventional and novel methods for microalgae culture and biomass harvest, as well as recent developments in techniques for microalgal biofuel production.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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