Top 10 Algae Companies

The following is our list of interesting prospects that we are putting forth in an Algae top 10 list of companies. This is a precursor to our official Top 10 which we will officially post by the end of the summer for 2011. We are encouraging you to make your comments and tell us who you would like to see in our official top ten list for 2011. There is no single guage for what makes a company a contender such as, most potential, largest commercial production, most influential technologies, biofuel producer or other. It is simply an assortment of companies which have caught our eye for one reason or another and are deserving of such a placement. Please comment and let us know who you think should be in the top 10 and why.

1. Sapphire Energy - Sapphire has often been favoured in this field for their large volume of patents and their simple open pond approach but I quite like them for their determination to move beyond research and development and approach it like a farmer. A go out and get your hands dirty approach and focus on increasing your harvests. In other words, they are results oriented.


2. Solazyme - From open pond to an enclosed fermentation approach. Solazyme uses heterotrophic strains with high lipid yields for a focus on high quality end products. This is another company and seems able to produce large volumes for big clients like the navy at a drop of a hat.


3. Algae.Tech - A new player on the scene with a recent successful IPO, but unlike the previously selected companies they do not have the track record yet. That being said, I see a lot more potential here though because they deal in very high density algal growth per square metre of land. With most land near CO2 emittors taged with a high cost of usage, this is a critical feature.


4. Algenol Biofuels - Another very exciting algae process where instead of harvesting the lipid oils, this company is producing ethanol from the sugars produced in the photsynthetic process. It is like an ethanol fermentation factory in each cell and the extraction process takes place by the escaping ethanol gases condensing on the inner shell of the greenhouse like reactor.


5. OriginOil - Simply put, I like their integrated system which shows some real promise. The interesting part is their business model which is not about being a producer but a licensor. Their current focus is on their single step quantum fracturing technology for extracting the oil from the algae.


6. Aurora Biofuels - The key to their success is in developing a strain of algae which is pale green and grows in saltwater so that light can penetrate further down into the culture. A real benefit for both open pond and tubular reactors.


7. Phycal - Here is a company where I am not seeing much differentiation in their product or approach. The difference here is in their geographic location. Hawaii is a very secluded state that is overly dependant on fossil fuels. Government incentives and a population that is in real need of their product makes this company really stand out.


8. Joule Unlimited - Now this is an interesting little company with a very unique photobioreactor set up that has been talking about their helioculture IP. They are a very secrative company so I can't read too deeply into these guys. As a result they could fall out of the top 10 just as easily as they fell into the top 10.


9. Live Fuels - I have not heard much from this company lately but I thought I would keep them in the running not because of their successes but because I see success for them in their process of feeding native algae to fish and then extracting the oil from the fish. I don't see success at scale but in other spin-off opportunities.


10. Ocean Nutrition Canada - This is an east coast company which is also one of the largest suppliers of Omega 3's in the world, and they just happened to have found a strain of algea with one of the highest percentage of lipid oils. They are working with a heterotorphic process and are flying under the radar, so watch out for these guys.