Chinese Company Uses Innovative Approach to Make Biofuel

The green gunge flowing through these tubes may look like the work of a mad scientist, but it is in fact one of the newest developments in the fight against global warming.

Chinese company ENN is using microalgae to capture carbon dioxide and create biofuel, in what could be one of the greenest solutions yet to China's huge greenhouse gas emissions.

Gan Zhongxun, leader of ENN's research institute, explains why algae, one of the fastest growing organisms on Earth is so ideal for carbon capture.

[Gan Zhongxun, Research Institute Leader, ENN]:
"It absorbs CO2 several times, or over ten times, more effectively than soya beans or forest. Therefore choosing this kind of plant to undergo industrialization to increase its intensiveness and scale could effectively solve the problem of CO2 emissions and thus the greenhouse gas problem."

But algae is just one part of a system researchers say could one day dispose of 100 percent of the carbon dioxide created by the use of coal.

The coal is first gasified underground with the help of solar and wind power, and in the greenhouse the CO2 emitted is then passed through the algae and absorbed.

The algae is drained and turned into biodiesel, which could later be used to fuel vehicles.

While it is still in the experimental stages, ENN are confident that the system could be reducing the emissions of coal plants in the near future.

[Gan Zhongxun, Research Institute Leader, ENN]:
"By the end of next year we will have a demonstration project, and after three years the entire production process will be mature. After three years we will be able to develop it onto a large scale, so it could be introduced to power plants, chemical works, both in the city and in the countryside."

China, the world's biggest greenhouse gas emitter, has so far fallen behind in its pledge to cut 20 percent off the energy intensity of its economy by 2010.

As global powers hope for a replacement to the Kyoto protocol in Copenhagen this December, algae could offer a green glimmer of hope in uncertain times.