Algae.Tec Successfully Completes $5m Capital Raising With Patersons Securities

Posted On: February 3, 2012

Algae.Tec Ltd has announced that the AUD$5,000,000 (USD$5,354,086.97) Placement through Patersons Securities Limited has been successfully completed.

As previously stated, this capital raising will be utilised to fund the fast-tracking of commercial projects recently announced.

Algae.Tec Executive Chairman, Roger Stroud, said the Company was extremely pleased with the capital raising.

“This again demonstrates that sophisticated investors are aligned with the need for alternative transport fuel technologies such as the Algae.Tec enclosed algae to biofuels solution,” said Stroud.

“The market is also responding to the recent milestones and commercial deal announcements the Company has signed with major companies in China, Sri Lanka and Europe.”

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UC Davis and University of Tokyo collaborating on algae biofuels project

Posted On: January 22, 2012

A better understanding of how algae can be used to make biofuels is the aim of a new joint project between UC Davis and the University of Tokyo, Japan. It is one of four new grants, jointly funded by the US National Science Foundation and the Japan Science and Technology Agency, to develop environment-friendly fuels and reduce pesticide use.

The four grants, totaling $12 million (¥960 million), will be divided between the Japanese and US laboratories. UC Davis’ share will be about $1.5 million over three years, with the possibility of renewal for another two years.

All four projects are based on metabolomics, an approach that uses high-tech analysis to understand all the chemicals involved in a living cell’s metabolism.

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OriginOil and DOE to Develop Direct Conversion of Algae into Renewable Crude Oil Source

Posted On: January 22, 2012

Good news on the algae-to-oil front has been released by Los Angeles-based OriginOil, Inc., in conjunction with the US Department of Energy. The company will work in partnership with Idaho National Laboratory (INL) to help algae growers to enter the global crude oil market.

OriginOil, a developer of a technology platform to extract oil from algae, reports that it plans to co-develop an integrated system with the DOE’s INL for direct conversion of raw algae into a renewable crude oil that can be used by existing petroleum refineries.

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Algae-based fuels a growing business in New Mexico

Posted On: January 22, 2012

Sapphire Energy Inc., which uses a proprietary process to turn algae oil into renewable gasoline to replace fossil fuels at the pump, broke ground last June on a 300-acre commercial demonstration facility in Columbus.

In Hobbs, in the heart of southeast New Mexico’s oil patch, Massachusetts-based Joule Unlimited Inc. broke ground this fall on a five-acre site that will use concentrating-solar biorefineries to extract ethanol and diesel from bacteria in salt-water mixed with carbon dioxide.

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United States Patent and Trademark Office issues patent to Heliae

Posted On: January 12, 2012

Heliae, an Arizona-based algae technology company, announced today three significant additions to its expanding portfolio of intellectual property.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office issued patent number 8,084,038 to Heliae entitled “Methods of and Systems for Isolating Nutraceutical Products from Algae” on December 27, 2011. Heliae has received a Notice of Allowance from the USPTO for two additional patent applications focused on Heliae’s breakthrough extraction technology. These patents are expected to issue in the first half of February.

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GlycoMar awarded grant for collaboration with MicroA of Norway

Posted On: January 5, 2012

The UK Technology Strategy Board today announced funding of a collaboration between GlycoMar and MicroA of Norway for the pilot scale production of one of GlycoMar’s biologically active polysaccharides from a marine microalga using MicroA’s patented photobioreactor technology.

The project will use MicroA’s recently patented PBR technology as the scale-up platform for GlycoMar’s microalgal polysaccharide product development. MicroA will use their pilot scale system to optimise growth conditions for maximum algal polysaccharide production. GlycoMar will optimise downstream processing to maximise recovery of the target product. The project will establish the commercial viability of full-scale production.  Success of the project will be an important milestone for both partner companies and the wider biotechnology and microalgae industries, and will lead to commercialisation as a high value natural skin care ingredient within 3 years.

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Maersk Tests Algae-Based Biofuel in Cargo Voyage to India

Posted On: December 27, 2011

Maersk is testing a range of algae-based biofuel blends aboard a container ship headed to India as part of a project with the U.S. Navy.

Maersk, based in Denmark, has worked with the Navy for about 30 years. However, the biofuels testing program is the first partnership between the world’s largest commercial container carrier and the Navy’s Naval Sea Systems Command.

Both the Navy and the Maersk Line, which is part of the A.P. Moller – Maersk Group, are on a mission to reduce the environmental impacts of their operations at sea and on land.

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Turning algae into energy gets Halifax company on award shortlist

Posted On: December 27, 2011

A Halifax biotechnology company is hoping green slime will help its business take flight.

Marine Arctic & Antarctic Technologies Inc. is one of 10 startups that made the shortlist of the Nova Scotia Clean Tech Open, Innovacorp announced Wednesday.

The competition’s goal is to assist a clean technology company in getting established in the province.

Marine Arctic & Antarctic Technologies is developing technology to mass produce micro-algae for use in biofuel and other products.

“It’s like slop,” CEO Mather Carscallen said of the raw material during an interview.

“Some of it smells bad. Some of it doesn’t. It’s pretty much every different smell, shape, colour you could ever imagine.”

The algae would be incubated in a bioreactor that could vary in size and designed to be cost effective, he said.

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Health Enhancement Products, Inc. expands scientific inquiry at Battelle as algae-derived molecules are tested for bioactivity

Posted On: November 27, 2011

The board directors of Health Enhancement Products, Inc. (OTCBB: HEPI), a Scottsdale, AZ-based food ingredients and nutraceutical enterprise, has authorized an expanded study of its algae extracts. Since May of 2011, the Company has been working with Battelle, the world’s largest independent research and development organization, to isolate the active molecules in its proprietary algae extract, specifically those natural compounds responsible for supporting a healthy cholesterol balance. Over the intervening months, Battelle research scientists have conducted a series of experiments to separate bioactive fractions of the algae extract in order to isolate and further characterize the bioactive components.

That program has resulted in a number of isolates that can now be tested in vivo. The in vivo portion of this expanded research project will be carried out in several steps. The in vivo study is expected to commence in several days. The isolated samples will be administered to test subjects over the course of 30 days, after which an evaluation process would identify those samples with bioactivity. Battelle scientists would subject those samples to further refinement and validation, or proceed directly to a final analysis.

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NZ Biotech company Photonz successfully transfers omega-3 fermentation process to industrial scale Canadian pilot plant

Posted On: November 27, 2011

Biotech company Photonz Corporation has achieved a major milestone on the path to commercially manufacturing, by fermentation, the high-value omega-3 fatty acid, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). It has successfully transferred its strain and fermentation process, developed in Auckland, to a contract facility in Canada, which has then used that process to ferment material from algal biomass in a 7.5 tonne industrial scale reactor. This demonstrates the feasibility of commercial production of EPA from marine microalgae.

The Canadian facility has a battery of reactors and support utilities that enable it to operate multi-tonne scale fermentations under industrial conditions. During the project it produced sufficient biomass for Photonz to complete development of the downstream purification processes for its EPA product, also at pilot industrial scale.

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