Then and Now: 120 Bioeconomy Pioneers look at yesterday, today, inspirations and challenges

Stafford “Doc” WIlliamson

Then: I was trying to interest local municipalities in a wet pyrolysis process to produce jet fuel from sewage solids and sawdust. They said it would never work. Ah well, ahead of the curve again.

Now: We are discussing a pilot scale of our covered raceway system for concentrated rapid growth algae in the Middle East deserts. “Renewable, sustainable energy will change the world but a source of renewable sustainable energy that also feeds a planet of 9 billion people leads me to the inevitable conclusion that algae will play a major role.

Inspirations: The world will change. It is changing. I hope that my contribution to that change will be significant Sources as diverse as former UK PM Tony Blair and Angela Merkel to Foreign Policy magazine have all advocated some version of a Marshall Plan for Africa. Again, algae could be a major salvation as a source of “green” jet fuel as well as food for the people, assuming that such a plan is, as I call it, a “Green Energy Marshall Plan for Latin America and Africa” (GEMPALA).

Challenges: There is currently no source(s) of sustainable renewable aviation fuel to serve the international airline industry in all of Africa.  I have been advocating a massively intense development of algae as privately funded SMB’s all over Sub-Saharan Africa for many years and it would seem that no one is listening which is odd since providing other forms of “”green energy”” could also be a major stimulus for American manufacturing at the same time. Oh, yes, and the world doesn’t seem to realize the urgency of climate change mitigation.