Quote:
Originally Posted by August
I thought the algae were supposed to eat carbon?
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They use solar energy to synthesize carbon dioxide (CO2) and dihydrogen monoxide (H2O, commonly called water) into organic material usually but not always sugars.
Ofcourse they also need phosphate, nitrogen, sulfur and other chemicals as building blocks but they get their energy from photosynthesis. What we humans want to do is to process algae to hydrocarbons (molecules containing carbon and hydrogen) which can be burned to run our little toys like cars, aircrafts, ships and power plants.