Part1. Interview record

Date：September. 15, 9 am.

Location：China Steel Corp. conference hall

CSC： What is the adaptability of E. coli for the corporate? Do you have any doubt about the actual application?

It can be explained from the following points:

1. Concentration:

Bacteria can tolerate the increase of CO₂ concentration. However, there is limit in the input, and our team is targeting this system.

A shunt is designed to slow down the rate of input to enter the bacteria rapidly.

2. Temperature:

In this system, 42 degrees Celsius is our limit, and we need to overcome by technology in the high temperature.

The problem is that our team will lower the temperature through other devices.

3. Waste:

Our team solves the problem of waste by recycling and filtering out.

CSC ：From the perspective of the company, how much additional benefit can it bring to the output value of the products in their downstream of system?

At present, the product of downstream in our system is glutamine, and the reason why we choose is because glutamine is accessible and easy to operate for us. Its additional benefit refers to the different application. Take the market value of glutamine as an example, the additional benefit can reach 10 times larger of the E. coli culture cost, ignoring the fixed cost of the whole system.

Besides, E. coli was regarded as high potential species to produce all kinds of protein. Including essential amino acid that cannot be synthesized by organism, or forage for stock farmer. Therefore, our system has high potential output value to bring great additional benefit.

CSC：China Steel is one of the largest carbon consumer in our country. In your presentation, you mentioned that two-thirds of Taiwan's area was required to balance one-tenth of the current emissions. In practice, it is still too far away. Is it possible to match the materials with 3D layout?

We want to save the space and culture in high density concentration:

1. Reduce the volume of culture material
2. Stacking the bioreactors

CSC： How to deal with the waste of this system? Is there a problem with super Cryptococcus neoformans?

The protein needs to be separated before produced. At the same time, this process will produce the bio-waste. The special process is high temperature and high pressure. It can be used in the factory's original waste system under the high temperature and high pressure environment.

We use the general strains, and there is no possibility of mutations. In addition, with the monitoring of environmental, the probability of mutation is greatly reduced to reach biosafety.

CSC position description：

Algae is one of the implementation of the CCS plan, and they always want to build a multi-system. Each system has its advantages and disadvantages. Therefore, what we proposed was one more choice for them and they were glad to hear that E. coli and contribute to CCS & U (Carbon Capture Storage and Utilization).

Part2. Customer demand investigation

1. The research and development of new technologies, which level will be considered to mature and worthy investing specifically?

There are three conditions:

1) Feasibility of laboratory technology: It’s okay with technical confirmation.

2) Feasibility of engineering: It’s feasible under engineering equipment construction, application of space and on-site environmental conditions.

3) Feasibility of economic: total cost (input, output) must be positive benefits.

2. There is a problem of limited space in Taiwan, how much space that we need to reduce at least in the enterprise?

This proposition should be how much CO₂ the technology can absorb per unit area. Based on this basis, industrial will evaluate the existing space of the factory, consider how much CO₂ can be absorbed, and investment cost of equipment. Therefore, a certain amount of CO₂ can be reduced. We will also calculate the input and output to evaluate if it has positive benefit.

3. We will consider the secondary cost of waste disposal, just like the application of CSC unit in basic-oxygen-furnace slag, will you consider the cost of waste recycling be beneficial? Or is there a problem caused by China Steel and secondary pollution?

This part cannot be provided due to operational confidentiality. It is recommended that this proposition should be turned into be directly used as a marketable product. The cost of the resource should be assessed by the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) as a whole.

4. Since our project is facing the problem of the higher cost of culture medium, we would like to ask the question about the benefit of carbon fixation and cost of carbon fixation method.

The cost of carbon fixation depends on the carbon capture and storage methods used. For example, the calcium circuit developed by the Industrial Research Institute is used to capture carbon. The recent cost of carbon capture is intended to be reduced to US$30 per ton, and US$10 per ton of geological storage is required. Competition between carbon capture methods can be assessed by cost and overall utilization of reuse.

5. Regarding the part of industry-university cooperation, Why CSC chose to cooperate with Annan Campus in NCKU for microalgae carbon fixation.

When the former academic research unit strives for the NEP project (National Energy Program), the technology that the audited authority usually requires that project must be adopted by the industry. Therefore, both the academic research center and the industry usually sign the cooperation letter of intent for review. For China Steel, it is willing to support the academic research community to conduct forward-looking technical research with national resources to provide the technical information needed to evaluate feasibility.

6. The medium we need will still consume energy in the process of preparation, and it may cause carbon emissions simultaneously. We wonder how to regard upon overall carbon footprint may be increased from the perspective of enterprise.

If the overall footprint of the carbon fixation process developed may be positive (increased), in general, from the perspective of carbon reduction within the enterprise, there is no possibility of application. If the derived external carbon reduction benefit is greater than the internal carbon loss, it proves to have a positive net benefit to the environment. As long as it meets the feasibility of engineering and economic, the enterprise is willing to adopt it.

7. Research on carbon fixation, what is the driving force for China Steel in addition to economic benefits?

Regulatory requirements, corporate identity and social responsibility.

Part3. Picture Record

Part1. Interview record

Date：October. 6, 14 pm.

Location：Biotechnology Green Energy Expo conference hall

1. Is the bioreactor technology being involved in ITRI?

There is a biotechnology laboratory in ITRI. They work on converting microalgae into bio-fuel and dry anaerobic fermentation. Therefore, bioreactor technology was involved in ITRI.

2. After the carbon capture process, how to transfer those captured CO₂ while being condensed?

Once CO₂ was captured, we will liquefy it to decrease volume and then the vehicles will carry those high density liquefaction CO₂ to storage. Or through piping, we can transfer captured CO₂. to north of the sea for sequestration.

However, technology of carbon capture and storage (CCS) didn't implement in Taiwan, since that the inhabitant in Taiwan regarded CCS as environmentally hazardous technology. More and more national disaster due to climate led to local doubts about the safety of CCS. The currently policy of reduce carbon emission is to reach 2% decreasing CO₂ emission on 2020 compared with the standard year. The long-term emission reduction goal is to cut emission in 2050 by 50% compared to 2005 levels totally we hope to clean 1 hundred million tons of CO₂. The main challenge was the downstream process of CCS, utilizing technology.

According to the Greenhouse Gas Reduction and Management Act which was passed by Taiwan’s parliament (the Legislative Yuan), 1 ton of carbon tax is NTD 100 (35 USD), which is that industrial work hard to avoid high tax. However, what is the next step?

3. In the downstream process, can we reuse the waste heat produced from the factory for sterilization?

That is not a big problem. The temperature of waste heat produces from factory is around 100 to 1500 and 150 degrees Celsius is suitable for our sterilization. So it is kind of a win-win situation because it do not cost extra energy or money for factory.

4. Taiwan does not focus on carbon sequestration, so will Taiwan use our technique? How to reduce the cost?

From the cost side, it is one thousand per gram because is not large scale but only laboratory level. How much cost can be reduced for one ton? How much cost can be reduced if we enlarge the scale? It does not cost too much reusing the industrial waste.

5. Now the technology renewable energy is mature, why not convert carbon dioxide into energy?

If we convert it to bio-fuel, the cost is NTD 50 (2 USD) per litter. And the price that China Petroleum Corporation (CPC) sells is NTD 30 (1 USD) per litter. Although the government will subsidize NTD 20 (1 USD), it might not be a long-term strategy. The industrial must find a way to reduce the cost itself. Besides, the edible product is more valuable than energy, but it also has higher limitation about listing.

Date：August. 8, 10 am.

Location：National Cheng Kung University An-nan campus

1. Can the microalgae survive with flue gas from the industrial?

The flue gas from CSC contained about 6~7% CO₂ which is affordable for microalgae cultivation. Some species of microalgae can even survive under higher SOx and NOx condition. Therefore, the flue gas can be piped into microalgae cultivation demonstration plant directly without pre-adjusted.

2. How does microalgae culture control gas flow, temperature and pH?

With PE material, the air pipeline is plugged into the bottom of the culture pool. The pumped air can also help them stirr. Aspirator connected to a pore on the top to exhaust the net air. Since that the culture pool is implemented under the shade roof, temperature controller isn’t required. Besides, pH condition must be maintained around 7 while pre-culture.

3. Before culture the new species of microalgae, how to clean the pool completely?

First, exhaust the medium from the bottom and then jet the water to remove the microalgae attachment. Then, add some bleach to kill the rest of microalgae in the pool.

Secondly, microalgae in the effluent medium will be separated by centrifugation. The separated microalgae will be storage through lyophilization. The microalgae attachment problem in the pipeline can be cleaned through jetting water and bleached as well.

4. What is the value of byproduct?

The separated microalgae can be used to reed shrimp since that the microalgae is one of the important nutrient sources for shrimp. Through the shrimp farming, it can also extract Lutein which has high commercial value in the market.

5. How to select the specie of microalgae?

Before culturing microalgae in the open pond, we will pre-culture in the lab and test it under different conditions. Through many experiments, we can select the final species of microalgae which has the best growth condition, like heat-resisting.

Picture record