Significant production of algae biofuels could provide a substantial portion of transportation fuel needs. That's because algae have a much higher productivity potential than crop-based biofuels. These high yields can be attributed to algae's high growth rate, which is often monitored in hours instead of days, and to requiring inputs of only land, sunlight, water, carbon dioxide (potential for carbon credits), and nutrients. While deriving fuel oil from algae might have been cost prohibitive in the past, the cost of a barrel of algal oil, once commercialized, has been forecast as low as $20.
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