OriginOil Launches Smart Algae Harvester Product Line To Industry Praise
Workhorse model is first to launch with a live demonstration at National Algae Association workshop, while new lab-scale unit is developed with intensive crowdsourcing
Los Angeles – February 17, 2015 – OriginOil Inc. (OTC/QB: OOIL), developer of Electro Water Separation™ (EWS), the high-speed, chemical-free process to clean up large quantities of water, announced today that it has launched the Smart Algae Harvester™ line of low-energy algae concentrators, on the heels of a live demonstration to attendees of a National Algae Association (NAA) workshop in Lafayette, Louisiana. (video) (presentation)
The first model in the new line is the A25, a workhorse algae harvester designed for scale-up testing and initial production. It can process up to 25 liters per minute, or up to 36,000 liters (about 10,000 gallons) of algae cultivation water every day, producing a viable concentrate with extended shelf life, for a wide variety of applications, including nutritionals. Add-on units are planned to further concentrate the harvested algae, and also to pelletize it for feed.
Nicholas Eckelberry, co-founder and chief research officer, demonstrated the new Smart Algae Harvester A25 following his presentation at the NAA workshop. The new unit drew praise for its solid design, advanced controls and highly effective harvesting capabilities.
Al Szur, Managing Member of NAA incubator program company, Natural Algae Production, stated, “I’ve had the opportunity to see the older machine operate. The new machine… we will be harvesting with it, it’s like going from grammar school into college.”
Stuart Gardiner, a rancher and Area Range Conservationist with the USDA, also said, “The new OriginOil harvester for microscopic algae is impressive. We are familiar with the older model and this seems to be a substantial improvement over that. We’re impressed, and as soon as we get up to the scale to where we have a large amount to harvest we’re really looking forward to utilizing it.”
And Steve Herman, CEO of Renewable Algae Group, added, “We are a startup company out of Wisconsin, partnered with St. Cloud State University, and we’ve been growing algae for about 4 months now. This harvester is the only one we’ve used, because the University said they’ve gone through many different ones over the past 10 years and they said this is the one to use. So we took their advice and it works great.”
Next, OriginOil plans to launch a smaller, lab-scale algae model for researchers, with the full participation of the researcher community. In initial surveys, 67% of industry insiders surveyed said that a lab-scale harvester would be “Very” or “Extremely” Useful.
