Biological mitigation of carbon dioxide via microalgae: Recent development and future direction

Abstract

A review. The major gas leading to global warming and greenhouse gas emission is elevated carbon dioxide in the atm., which called for effective carbon dioxide mitigation technologies. Traditional carbon dioxide mitigation methods included capture and storage, which involved a series of technologies such as absorption, adsorption, gas-sepn. membranes and cryogenic distn. However, these methodologies are considered as cost expensive and non-sustainable. A promising technol. is the biol. capture of carbon dioxide using microalgae, which have fast growth rate and high photosynthetic efficiency. The microalgae can fix CO2 using solar energy with efficiency of ten to fifty times greater than terrestrial plant, and can be cultivated on non-fertile land. In this review, the promising microalgae for effective CO2 fixation and the effect of CO2 fixation by microalgae are introduced. The effect of reactor configurations, light intensity, light/dark cycle, temp., pH, CO2 concn., CO2 fixation rates, mass transfer and nutrients requirement (including nutrients such as N and P derived from a variety of wastewater sources, e.g., agricultural run-off, concd. animal feed operations, and industrial and municipal wastewater) on CO2 fixation are analyzed. Finally, the application and economic viability as well as future trends and perspectives of microalgae biol. CO2 fixation are also discussed in depth. [on SciFinder(R)]