National Algae Association Executive Director Barry Cohen Named to Top 100 People in Bioenergy

The poll, conducted by Biofuels Digest, attracted more than 15,000 votes from Digest readers, and more than 400 individuals received votes, including more than 150 write in candidates. The Top 100 people include representatives from the Department of Energy, the USDA, and universities and companies from around the world.

While flattered to be included in such an influential group, Cohen said "It's not about me - it's about the $700 billion a year leaving the US for foreign oil! This accolade really belongs to the group of algaepreneurs who share my vision of energy independence, and are willing to work tirelessly to help make it happen!" Cohen continued, "This country has already spent billions of dollars on R&D over the last 50 years– and it will continue to fund research and development. But the time has come to move algae technologies out of laboratory settings and into commercial scale production, and to build-out the algae production supply channel.

As an association, we agree that algae will deliver soon because most of the hard science problems regarding algae have been solved, and the NAA Engineering Consortium has developed preliminary design specs for a 100-acre commercial scale algae production facility build-out, identifying and resolving many of the scale-up issues that will be encountered as we move the industry out of the lab and into commercialization.

The proof that it is a possibility is that commercial-scale algae growing, harvesting and extraction equipment have already been built using off-the-shelf, proven technologies. The proof of the heightened level of interest in taking the next step towards building this emerging industry is that close to 3,000 acres of land have been spoken for in the first two weeks of the Algae Production Incubator program we recently launched,” said Cohen, “and we continue to work towards lowering costs and risks inherent in new industries. It’s estimated to be a $1.4 trillion dollar industry, so there’s plenty of room for everyone. We just need to get it done!”