BioFuels Journal

Origin Oil notes:

OriginOil, Inc., based in Los Angeles, CA, is about to launch its technology to convert algae to biofuels with a pilot plant in Los Angeles at the end of January.

BioFuels Journal spoke Jan. 14 with OriginOil President and CEO Riggs Eckelberry.

Highlights From the Podcast

• OriginOil launched in 2007 to industrialize algae as a fuel.

• Petroleum was originally algae and can produce drop-in replacement fuels (for those based on petroleum) with fuels and products based on algae such as gasoline, diesel, plastics, jet fuel, varnishes, and pharmaceuticals.

• To make commercial pilot systems available to customers in 2010. Process dewaters algae economically.

• With OriginOil's process, lower concentrations of algae will still allow large harvests of algae, requiring low energy to produce industrial volumes.

• There are major challenges in commercializing algae as feedstock for biofuel, such as energy use and dewatering issues. Eckelberry believes OriginOil's process can overcome those challenges.

Riggs Eckelberry, President and CEO

One of the inventors of the OriginOil's breakthrough technology, Riggs Eckelberry brings his veteran technology management skills to the alternative energy sector.

As President and COO of CyberDefender Corporation from 2005 to 2006, he was instrumental in building the company and its innovative product line, helping to achieve initial funding and a public company filing (CYDE.OB).

From 2001 to mid-2005, he helped launch and turn around technology companies as founder and President of TechTransform, a technology consulting firm.

In 2004, he was a key member of the team that commercialized YellowPages.com, resulting in its sale for $100 million to SBC/BellSouth. In 2003, he helped make Panda Software a key player in the US market as the General Manager of its US unit. During the high-tech boom of the 1990s, he was responsible for the global brand success of the software product, CleanSweep; as Chief Operating Officer of MicroHouse Technologies, he drove record sales and a modernization of the company's technology, helping to achieve a successful sale of the company to Earthweb; and as VP Marketing of venture-backed TriVida, he was a key member of the team that commercialized the company's technology and achieved the sale of this technology company to BeFree, Inc. (now part of ValueClick: VCLK).

For more information, call 201-465-8026.

See Related Websites/Articles:

• OriginOil, Inc.

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