Our project manager, Andrew Mitchelmore, presented an overview of the project at the NZ Geothermal Workshop in Rotorua (November 2025).This was an opportunity to share the project scope and updates with the New Zealand geothermal community and international visitors, including academic researchers, industry operators, regulators and more.
This project was presented as a case study that profiles the first project to couple the production of a protein with geothermal gases and extremophilic microorganisms sourced from geothermal environments. You can read the conference paper here for more details.
A series of previous research projects showed at a laboratory scale that a co-culture of New Zealand geothermal microorganisms (a bacterium and a microalga) can consume the industrial gases, carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) as a food source for growth. This generates a biomass that is rich in protein (ca. 60%) and was shown to be non-toxic, nutritious, and digestible(in mice). The biomass produced also contains several potentially valuable components, which could be extracted to enhance commercial viability.
The biomass is not yet a market-ready product, nor has the technology platform been proven at an industrially-relevant environment or scale. We are developing a new product using a novel process that requires a new technology platform (incorporating bioreactors, gas handling equipment and post- processing). The technology platform will include elements of a fermentation bioreactor (for growing the methanotroph = bacterium) and photobioreactor (for growing the phototroph =algae). Concurrent with technical development, we are evaluating target markets and pathways to these markets, including regulatory requirements and analysis of the techno-economics.
The concept is that, commercially, the biomass could be produced on-site, co-located with a commercial geothermal facility (i.e., power plant, infrastructure, and steam-field)and then distributed to feed manufacturers. The geothermal facility would provide ready access to necessary process inputs (on a commercial basis, withfinancial models to be explored), including low-carbon electricity, methane, carbon dioxide, water, and heat.
