Algae to crude oil: Million-year natural process takes minutes in the lab

In the PNNL process, a slurry of wet algae is pumped into the front end of a chemical reactor. Once the system is up and running, out comes crude oil in less than an hour, along with water and a byproduct stream of material containing phosphorus that can be recycled to grow more algae. http://phys.org/news/2013-12-algae-crude-oil-million-year-natural.html