Using algae to produce sustainable fuel is making its way from Baltimore to England

Maryland businesses scored a contract in the UK to help a wastewater treatment plant boost its production of renewable fuel. 

BrightWave, a company headquartered in Columbia building what are called photobioreactors to grow algae, is the central firm in the deal valued at nearly $3 million. Founded in 2019, BrightWave developed this technology to provide sustainable solutions in different sectors — including using material made from algae to replace limestone in Portland cement production and substitute synthetic dyes used in MRIs. 

Cofounders Tim Shaw and Ken Peretti met years ago through each other’s kids. They were inspired by the global push to decarbonize and saw the potential of using algae as an agent for carbon capture. The global demand for biofuel is expected to reach 39 billion liters per year by 2028, up from 2022’s 13 billion, per the International Energy Agency. 

“We just figured we wanted to do something clean and green, and we could leave a good legacy,” said Shaw, who serves as BrightWave’s president. “Algae just has a value that is not a fad.”

BrightWave is sending eight of its industrial, 40,000-liter photobioreactors to Northumbrian Water Limited in northeast England through the port of Baltimore. Shaw and Peretti met representatives from the wastewater treatment company at a trade show overseas. 

While the company cleans the wastewater, energy is produced. Rather than the typical sludge created out of a wastewater treatment plant, the algae will be used to create fuel for planes, explained CEO Peretti. 

“Sustainable aviation fuels is a worldwide problem, just like wastewater treatment is,” Peretti told Technical.ly. “If you can connect the dots, having algae be used for sustainable aviation fuels that comes from wastewater treatment — oh my goodness.”

BrightWave’s technology is patented, because of how it uses a light source within the photobioreactors, rather than outside of it. It also works indoors, where it’s typically difficult to grow algae at scale. So far, the firm has eight customers.

Collaborating with Maryland businesses

The founders also found a way to use rings that move up and down to scrape algae off the light source, so it doesn’t grow on the light itself. Total Plastics, a fabrication company and distributor based in Baltimore, is behind crafting those rings and tubing for BrightWave. 

The two firms have worked together since BrightWave’s founding, and it’s been a continuous collaboration to figure out which hardware would work best for the photobioreactors. 

“It’s been a little bit of a back and forth,” account manager Jason Middlesworth told Technical.ly. 

He remembers having to track down 7-foot tubing, when the largest Total Plastics typically provided was 6 feet. These days, the distributor procures tubing double that length — 14 feet — for the wastewater treatment contract. 

Bauen Innovations, a 3D-printing company out of Arbutus in Baltimore County, has been working with BrightWave in developing 10 out of the 60 components in the photobioreactor. The team is also tasked with producing the master drawings — that’s to make sure the planned designs can be carried out, per Brandon Kostinsky, the head of project and service coordination, and for other vendors to be aware of how it’s all supposed to fit together. 

Tech commercialization firm/investor Early Charm‘s subsidiary Sanosona is also involved in the manufacturing and assembly process, and Arnold Packaging in Baltimore created custom-designed shipping crates to ship the photobioreactors. 

BrightWave’s Shaw and Peretti live in Clarkesville, and have an affinity for Maryland for a few reasons. The state’s central location is one benefit, with their tech being shipped out from the port in the city. 

Plus, the local university system has supported them. The Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology hosted BrightWave in their labs to do research and development during the height of the pandemic as the building sat empty. 

“We could have been a COVID casualty, if not for them,” Shaw said. 

Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant in Baltimore also allowed Brightwave to work on research and development at their facility early on. That’s where the pair discovered how to produce algae from placing a light inside the photobioreactor and how to produce as much algae as they can now, per Peretti. 

More interest from global players 

BrightWave is finding increasingly more customers overseas, because other countries are more focused on reducing the sheer amount of greenhouse gasses. In 2022, greenhouse gas emissions totaled 6,343 million metric tons in the US, a 2% decrease from the 90s, per the Environmental Protection Agency. 

The company has pending contracts across the globe including others in Sweden, Australia and Malaysia, Shaw said. 

Why is the US not as focused on addressing greenhouse gases? It’s all about the money, Peretti said.

“The companies would rather pay the penalties than get a solution,” Peretti said, “because the cost of the penalties are less than the cost of the solutions.”