Algae In Your Smokestack

The scientist Isaac Berzin is one of many pioneering the idea of biofuel in a new way. Based off of methods he developed for NASA in the 90s, he uses algae to capture emissions from smokestacks and convert it into bio-fuel. On a sunny day they can capture up to 80% of emissions and re-appropriate it in the form of bio-fuel. The CO2 is released upon burning the bio-fuel, but still by doubling the uses for the fuel you effective cut emissions in half (multiplied by the % absorbed originally by the algae so optimistically you'd reduce emissions by 40%.) Perhaps with further refinement the algae could have peak absorbency around 90% and could be used on all CO2 emitting technologies. So every emission would have a filter on it but instead of just being collected and discarded it would be reused infinitely. By keeping the carbon on the ground so to speak, we could mitigate human emission both in the short term and long term, perhaps returning carbon levels to something that the planet could handle.

Here's a link to some background on his work - http://www.greenprophet.com/2008/06/20/8154/isaac-berzin-algae-biofue/