Why am I researching seaweed?
Why study seaweed?
Millions of tons of Sargassum seaweed are washing up on beaches from Florida to the Caribbean, creating a stinky, toxic mess. The piles of decomposing seaweed release toxic gases that are unsafe for humans, and they also kill marine life by blocking sunlight and depleting oxygen. The SaBRe project is trying to transform the masses of Sargassum into something useful for humanity by engineering enzymes to break it down into “biofuels, animal feeds, chemicals to replace petrochemicals, bioplastics, and pharmaceuticals” (great article about it from Nautilus).
Is turning seaweed into fuel going to solve climate change?
No. The only way to prevent catastrophic global warming is to stop burning fossil fuels. That is now a question of politics, not science. (Renewable energy is far cheaper than fossil fuels for electricity generation and has been for years. Source: Our World in Data)
Is biofuel even a good idea?
It depends. Biofuel in the U.S. generally means growing corn to burn as gasoline, which is neither efficient nor carbon-neutral. (As put by Hannah Ritchie, “Putting food into cars is a poor use of land.”) While electrification is the clear winner for cars, there are some cases where electrification isn’t feasible, like long plane flights. In those cases, using biofuels is better than more fossil fuel extraction. If we do need biofuel, wouldn’t it be better if we didn’t have to use valuable food-growing land (i.e. the entire U.S. Midwest) to produce it? This is where the hypothetical seaweed refineries come in. (Note that the end product might not be biofuel: animal feed, pharmaceuticals, and bioplastics are also on the table.)
What problems will it solve?
Getting rid of the gross seaweed piles is an obvious benefit. Is there an economic case for using seaweed in manufacturing? Seaweed bioprocessing is still in the early stages of R&D. We don’t know yet whether the economic benefits will outweigh the costs, because the technology required to convert seaweed into useful goods at scale hasn’t been invented. We’re hoping that the answer is yes.