Aquaflow on track with algal technology

Media Release

November 30, 2008

Aquaflow on track with algal technology

BLENHEIM, NEW ZEALAND: Shareholders at Aquaflow Bionomic Corporation’s annual General Meeting on Friday, November 28, were excited to hear that the company had achieved a number of key milestones in its mission to commercialise its algal biofuel and water remediation technology.

In his progress report, Aquaflow chairman Barrie Leay told the meeting that the company was on track and can:

• reduce pollution and eutrophication (excessive plant growth which kills animal life by oxygen deprivation) of rivers, lakes and estuaries which is a serious problem around the world
• produce clean water from oxidation pond discharge streams suitable for re-use in lower grade applications
• continuously harvest algae at the rates of tonnes per day which is the great benefit of algae over many other annual biological crops produced for oil and,
• convert algae into ‘green crude’ which is expected to fit into existing refining infrastructures to produce suitable oil for various fuel and chemical uses.

Leay said early indications are that Aquaflow’s ‘green crude’ can be manufactured at prices competitive with fossil crude oil.

He went on to say the company had filed six patents in the US based upon the harvesting and processing techniques that it had developed in-house.

“Nothing we have learned in the past three years has changed our intellectual concepts that we should try to harvest wild micro-algae ... other techniques would not, in our view, have adequate energy balance for commercial biofuel production,” said Leay.

Marlborough-based Aquaflow announced in September that it had produced the world’s first sample of green-crude oil from wild algae using its proprietary process. And in October the company signed a Memorandum of Understanding with leading US refinery UOP to work together to commercialise algal biofuel technology and to sequester carbon dioxide from power plants.

The company has recently issued a prospectus to raise further capital to fund commercialisation of its technology.

Leay told shareholders that Aquaflow’s water remediation process could be invaluable for a world in urgent need of good quality water.

“Because of the large volumes of discharge water that we can process, clean water will be a very important part of the revenue streams of the Aquaflow process as far into the future as we can see,” he said.

Leay confirmed the company has had discussions about water remediation with a Government laboratory in the United States.

He concluded that there was still a great deal to do to refine Aquaflow’s processes from start to finish and that this will be “a journey that may never end as there is still so much to learn about algae.”

www.aquaflowgroup.com

ENDS

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