The Chinese 2008 Olympics presented a unique challenge to rowing and sailing athletes: the local waterways were clogged with algae. Boats could not navigate through the sticky tangled mass that clung like barnacles to their hulls.
But, what was previously considered a noxious nuisance, is proving to be a godsend. China is converting the algae into gas. They are turning the nutrient-rich goop into biomass fuel to power a new fleet of green algae-mobiles. The solution is an inexpensive retrofit that makes any car on the road a flex-fuel vehicle that can run on virtually any combustible liquid. What Brazil has done with sugar cane, China is about to do with algae.
Algae is an unlimited renewable resource, costing practically nothing to produce, since it needs no planting, tending, or fertilizing. It feeds on the pollution in the water, and can be grown virtually anywhere, including sewage plants. Algae farms will soon be dotting the landscape, churning out vast supplies of algaenol, replacing corn-based ethanol as a better, cheaper alternative to oil.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing is that it all came about by accident. As the Chinese endeavored to remove the algae, storage of the thick goo quickly became a problem, choking landfills, until an intrepid innovator came up with the brainstorm of turning the green slime into biofuel. Had it not been for the Olympics, the Chinese would never have even bothered to clear it out, and its vast potential might never have been tapped.
It is fitting that the algae is green, since it has the power to turn the entire planet green, eliminating our dependence on oil entirely, making pollution, as well as high gas prices, a thing of the past.
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