WHILE oil prices have eased in the world market, anxiety continues as to how long the world’s petroleum reserves would cater to oil-dependent countries. But with the advent of studies geared toward harnessing biofuel from non-food sources, the surging global demand for oil may finally meet its end through “unconventional” and “renewable” measures.
At present, the UST Research Center for the Natural Sciences (RCNS) is conducting researches on new alternative fuel sources like plant seeds, microalgae, and thermophilic bacteria.
“Biofuel is one of our key research areas, together with the Department of Science and Technology (DOST). We saw its importance because it is a global concern affecting practically everyone,” RCNS Director Christina Binag said.
Alternative fuel research dates back to 1885 when Rudolf Diesel built the first diesel engine fueled by vegetable oil. But locally, biofuel research is still a budding enterprise.
Biofuels—produced from feedstock and other organic sources that are renewable such as trees, crops, and plant fiber—are fuels not composed substantially of petroleum or imported crude oil.
Biofuels include bioethanol, an alcohol product of the fermentation of carbohydrates like sugar in vegetable matter, sugarcane, corn, cassava, and nipa; and biodiesel, a biodegradable fuel extracted from animal fats and plant oils such as palm, rapeseed, bitaog, jatropha, soy, and coconut, which can be used for power generation.
UST’s biofuel study is a three-pronged research endeavor supervised by professors Maria Natalia Dimaano (seeds), Susana Baldia (microalgae), and Michael Valdez (thermophilic bacteria).
Oiling the seeds
Jatropha or tubang bakod, scientifically known as Jatropha curcas, is an agricultural waste but oil from its seed is said to be a viable substitute for diesel fuel.
The Philippine Forest Corp. (PFC), then headed by Thomasian ZTE-NBN scandal whistleblower Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada, approved the jatropha seed research as a biodiesel source after Dimaano presented a proposal.
Dimaano made the proposal upon the request of Prof. Maribel Nonato, former RCNS director and now dean of the College of Science, to seek grants for the study.
“(The study) earned approval from the PFC, and I worked on jatropha seeds’ oil characterization and optimization of the (seed’s) methyl ester oil yield, which is already a biodiesel,” Dimaano said.
According to UST Rector Fr. Rolando de la Rosa, PFC contracted three universities for the development of jatropha seeds.
“UST will develop the process by which the oil from jatropha can be separated. Once it is perfected, it goes to the University of the Philippines to study its toxicity then it will go to Ateneo de Manila University for its marketing,” De la Rosa said.
Last year, Dimaano also coached a group of Chemical Engineering students led by Juan Paulo Antonio to work on bitaog or Calophyllum inophyllum, a tropical tree abundant in the Philippine coasts.
“Seed oil from bitaog can help lessen green house emissions and lower demands for conventional diesel fuel because of its ability to counteract the carbon dioxide emission in vehicles,” Antonio said in an April 2008 interview with the Varsitarian.
The researchers, together with Dimaano, performed transesterification, a process that isolates potential biofuel components by employing variations in the concentration of methanol and sodium hydroxide; and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, a method for environmental analysis and specific identification of substances in a sample.
They found Oleic Acid and Linoleic Acid, two main fatty acid components which underscore bitaog’s potential as a biofuel.
“I closely monitored their study from the collection of bitaog, search for possible sources, extraction, and characterization of the seed oil yield,” Dimaano said.
The study won third place in the 2008 Bank of the Philippine Islands-DOST Outstanding Scientific Theses Awards.
Dimaano is working on the further fuel characterization and gas emission analysis of the jatropha and bitaog methyl ester. She is also exploring other plant seeds, such as malunggay and castor to compare their properties and viability as a source of biofuel with coco-methyl ester, also known as cocodiesel from coconut oil extracts.
Cocodiesel is already being mixed with diesel as mandated by Republic Act 9367 or the Biofuels Act of 2006, which requires the use of biofuels. It was signed into law in January 2007.
The microalgae “power”
Algae, which are large and diverse groups of simple, self-nourishing organisms that grow mostly in water, are also a promising source of biofuel.
“There are numerous reasons for considering the algal production system as a source of biofuel. It does not use depleting fossil fuel deposits—the primary source of crude oil in the world,” Baldia said. “It requires small land and limited supplies of water for culturing; it does not compete with food crops, has a high yield, and produces no pollution from the use of fertilizers or pesticides.”
Baldia’s study titled, “Enhancement of Culture Conditions of Microalgae Towards an Economically Feasible Production of Biofuel,” aims to create a “breeding ground” of microalgae to be able to obtain a sustainable amount of algal extracts as a source of biofuel.
“Microalgae possess significant quantities of fats and oils with compositions similar to those of vegetable oils. These large amounts of oils are made up of triacylglycerols which are transformed into biodiesel through transesterification,” Baldia added.
Baldia used two microalgae as her primary sources of algal oil extracts— cyanobacteria, formerly known as blue-green algae, which can reproduce at a rapid rate; and Botryococcus braunii, which produces large amounts of hydrocarbons, the most abundant chemical composition of crude oil with levels up to 90 percent.
Baldia later teamed up with Valdez in a project proposal titled, “Microalgal Oil and Cellulolytic Microbial Consortium-Based Bioethanol Towards an Economically Feasible Production of Biofuel,” which sought a “huge and competitive grant” from the DOST and the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science, Tokyo’s top research funding body.
The eventual commercialization of biofuel from algae will benefit the government since it will lessen the country’s dependence on fossil fuels, Baldia said.
“Algae have the ability to power vehicles and machinery, and absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, thus making a significant contribution to the environment,” she said.
‘Combusting’ heat-loving bacteria
Meanwhile, Valdez’s study focuses on thermophilic or “heat-loving” bacteria from different hot springs in the Philippines, which break cellulose—the most abundant and renewable non-fossil carbon source mostly from plants—to ferment starch in producing bioethanol.
“My objective is to provide baseline information on the potential of cellulolytic microbial consortia in providing a cheap source of sugars for an economic production of bioethanol,” Valdez said.
Based on his previous works on thermophilic bacteria, Caldicellulosiruptor sp. from a hot spring in Laguna is the most efficient in breaking down cellulose. Aside from it, natural members Clostridium sp., Fervidobacterium sp., Thermoanaerobacter sp.,and Dictyoglomus sp. of the microflora community where the isolate came from will also be used.
“It has been observed that a mixed culture of one cellulolytic bacterium together with other non-cellulolytic bacteria is ideal for degrading cellulose,” Valdez said. “In this study, I will determine the effect of eliminating each member of the consortia in terms of cellulose degradation to identify the interplay and role of the specific members.”
Lastly, Valdez will set up an ethanol fermentation system composed of a vessel containing the cellulolytic consortium, and diffuse the degraded sugars to an ethanol fermenting vessel.
The RCNS is tapping non-food sources for biofuel production rather than fuel-generating food sources like coconut and corn to preserve the country’s food supply, Binag said.
“The key is to balance the ecosystem using alternative fuels from non-food sources, which exist abundantly in nature. Our country is already deficient of food supply and if we will use food as an energy source, it would be unfair to the Filipino people and to the food industry.”
