NASA offshore algae project aims for pilot stage; licensed for Florida project

Biofuels Digest
December 20, 2009 Jim Lane

In California, researchers with the NASA Ames Research Center at Moffett Field are advancing in plans to deploy an ocean-based algal fuels platform. The OMEGA project deploys flexible floating plastic bags, up to a quater-acre in size – pumped with wastewater and then cleansed and harvested by barges every ten days.

The bags would release purified water via membranes on the sids of the quarter-acre bags. The project, which has received support from Google, the California Energy Commission, and NASA, is aiming towards a pilot-scale version in closed ponds, with locations near San Francisco and Santa Cruz in future deployments. Nevada-based Algae Systems has licensed the technology and is developing a project in Tampa Bay, Florida.

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