Sapphire interview
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betcha there will be a match.”
Sapphire is led by entrepreneur and scientist Jason Pyle, and is “ backed by a team of the nation’s leading researchers, scientists and blue-ribbon investors in early-stage companies.” Zenk says this combination of scientifi c and business expertise has been crucial to its initial success.
Level playing fi eld Development of Sapphire’s off ering – a method that derives fuel directly from algae through photosynthesis, locking up carbon in the process – is one that has required large amounts of capital investment from day one. Zenk says: “There are capital requirements all along the value chain – it’s not easy and it hasn’t been done before – so capital is required to align with the incredible amount of upfront research that had to occur to move the technology forward.
Barrels of ‘green crude’ “It requires biotechnology,
agricultural expertise and knowledge of the energy market in order
to develop a new energy source that is low carbon and doesn’t require us to change our existing infrastructure. “And that’s why the three pieces of the puzzle – scientists, researchers and investors – are absolutely essential.” But reaching the lofty heights Sapphire aspires to – a real revolution in energy production and use, in the US and worldwide – will be impossible without concrete support from government. Zenk cites historical precedents to support his claims.
“There has never been a source of energy developed without the leadership of government, and it won’t happen in algae fuel without that leadership”
“We will have spent about $100m to date, just to get our biology to the point where we can build a commercial-scale plant. So it’s an expensive process. “We have never moved from one source of energy to another without the government leading, be it the switch from sail power to coal, from coal to diesel, or from diesel to nuclear. “There has never been a source of energy developed without the leadership of government, and it won’t happen in algae fuel without that leadership.” Zenk’s demand is straightforward: Sapphire doesn’t require cash, he wants “simple parity” with energy companies worldwide, which have for decades benefi ted from assistance in developing resources.
Bill Gates, Exxon and the Rockefellers are investing in biofuel
WWW.CARBONWARROOM.COM
“The other thing government can do is help create demand,” Zenk says. “Governmental buying power – particularly from the military – can show they have some confi dence in the technology, giving investors the confi dence to invest. It’d be a great asset.”
If the US is to remain a major economic
power, securing low-cost, low-carbon energy supplies will be crucial. Zenk says: “There’s nothing more directly tied to our economic wellbeing than the availability of low-cost energy – the GDP of the US, the UK, Europe, China, all nations, is directly tied to the availability of energy. “There may be no more important business than investment in ensuring we have suffi cient supplies of clean energy, and if we don’t, countries like China will, and that’s not good and would destabilize the world for any number of reasons.”
From lab to market Zenk says there are any number of good ideas in the energy sphere that never see the light of day, with traversing the ‘valley of death’ from lab-scale demonstration of a technology’s feasibility through to commercial production, the ultimate barrier to overcome. “Once you get to a commercial demonstration stage, how do you attract the $100s of millions of market capital radius to take a technology that has never been scaled up to
ISSUE 02. JUNE 2011
Algae (above) are the key ingredient of ‘green crude’ (below)
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