Algae are considered as good carbon dioxide sequestering organisms, and can produce oil which can be converted into biodiesel.  These are the features that make the development of algae-based biofuels an attractive proposition.  However, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in the United States abandoned its algae-for-energy program in 1996.  One of the identified barriers was the “difficulty in replicating laboratory growth conditions” of the algae on a larger scale.  Some American companies, like Solix and Live Fuels, have begun to address these barriers.  These issues are discussed in a recent article in the journal Nature..