Virginia's first algae farm an experiment in biofuel

SPRING GROVE

There was much ado here Wednesday over the opening of an experimental farm - the first of its kind in Virginia - that grows a single, if slimy, commodity: algae.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine came and spoke, as did a state senator and state delegate who represent this rural area between Norfolk and Richmond, just east of Hopewell. Navy officers attended a VIP ceremony to christen the farm, as did dozens of environmentalists, scientists and curious businesses executives.

Algal Farms Inc. is a private-public venture that seeks to build on research at Old Dominion University into alternative energy. Its purpose: determine if algae can be grown, harvested and converted into biodiesel fuel, as well as a byproduct fertilizer, in sufficient amounts to make a decent profit.

Even the Rev. Macon Walton came and offered a prayer.

"Lord," Walton said, motioning to pools of green water and plant life gurgling before him, "bless, keep and protect this farm and this algae."

ODU has spent about $100,000 to get the operation up and running. Local entrepreneur Jes Sprouse said he is investing "a bunch more, pretty much all I've got," on the potential for creating the first commercially viable algae-to-biodiesel farm in Virginia.

"I'd like to thank my wife for not leaving me through this ordeal," said Sprouse, 35, a self-described "risk-taker" with a background in construction.

Pat Hatcher, an ODU scientist leading the project, said the concept has potential to create a new and clean energy supply and to cut a major source of pollution in the Chesapeake Bay.

Nutrients - nitrogen, phosphorus and ammonia - are causing too much algae growth in the Bay, choking water quality and threatening aquatic life, such as underwater grasses, crabs and fish.

If those nutrients from sewage treatment plants can instead be used at algae farms, Hatcher said, the Bay would benefit. ODU has been working with the Hampton Roads Sanitation District and now the city of Hopewell to use nutrient-rich wastewater as food for its algae.

"It's almost too good to be true," Hatcher said, "but in this case, it is true and can work."

The Kaine administration and state lawmakers have helped spur this and other renewable-energy research with more than $1.5 million in grants the past two years.

The algae project is especially close to his heart, Kaine noted, saying how he keeps a vial of brown, converted biodiesel on his desk in Richmond.

The farm today consists of big green containers of algae, which then are fed into a series of lined "raceways" in which the plants grow and are pushed to a settling basin.

Only a few ounces of biodiesel fuel are being created each day in this 1-acre setup. But Sprouse hopes to expand his ponds and algae production to about 200 acres over the next two years and to 2,000 acres within six years.

That way, he said, Algal Farms could churn out as much as 3,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre, or about 6 million gallons a year.

Asked who he would sell his fuel to, Sprouse did not blanche.

"Anybody sick and tired of paying 4 bucks for a gallon of diesel," he said.

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com