THIRD GENERATION BIOFUELS FROM ALGAE

THIRD GENERATION BIOFUELS FROM ALGAE

Croatian Center of Renewable Energy Sources (CCRES) have a new technology with major potential to contribute to the fight against climate change.As with all new technologies, careful consideration of potential impacts on the environment and human health is important.

The international community has acknowledges that global warming needs to be kept below 2˙C (3,6˙F) compared with the pre industrial temperature in order to prevent dangerous climate change.This will require significant reductions in the world´s emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases (GHG) over the coming decades.CCRES have one of the technologies that can help to achieve this.

The EU, which is responsible for around 11% of global GHG emissions today, has put in place binding legislation to reduce its emissions to 20% below 1990 levels by 2020.Europe is also offering to scale up this reduction to 30% if other major economies in the developed and developing world´s agree to undertake their fair share of a global reduction effort.

This is why the EU must support alternative fuels, in particular biofuels, with the triple objective of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, diversifying fuel supply and developing longterm replacements for fossil fuels.

Third generation biofuels from algae will have an important role to play as soon as they are ready for the market. They should be more sustainable, boasting both a lower enviromental impact and lower costs.Biofuels must become a commercial and competitive product using the broadest range possible of raw materials from both Nord and South Europe.

Biofuels from algae have a big role to reduce CO2 emmisions.

The sustainability of algae biofuels and their potential impacts on other sectors, including land use, are will remain critical issues.Algae biofuels provide an important contribution towards climate change mitigation and security of supply.They are only part of the solution, and must be considered in a wider context, in which efforts are also being made to reduce transport demand, improve transport efficiency and encourage the use of environmentally friendly modes of transport.

CCRES INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

CCRES international cooperation in algae biofuels research has a number of benefits for all involved:

• working together enhances synergies between the different partners
• partners can pool financial resources, share risk and set common standards for large or relatively risky research and development project
• it speeds up the development of the clean technologies we need if we are to tackle our energy related problems
• by linking up their efforts, partners can support a wider range of energy technologies and reduce the costs of key technologies
• networking allows partners to better coordinate their energy research agendas

Over the years, CCRES has build up strong and lasting research cooperation partnerships on specific energy topics with partner organizations.

Zeljko Serdar

President & CEO

Croatian Center of Renewable Energy Sources (CCRES)