The replacement of conventional vehicles with alternative fuel and/or electric vehicles will be done by the Virginia Office of Fleet Management Services whose office has been overlooking the operations of about 4,000 passenger vehicles. These 4,000 conventional vehicles are being uses by over 175 agencies and institutions across the state.

According to the executive order, the state is adamant in pursuing cost-effective and practical options to pursue, promote, and encourage the usage of alternative-fuel and/or electric vehicles. Moreover, Governor McDonell expressed that the move to resort to unconventional vehicles will largely decrease the long-standing dependence on foreign oil.

Relatively, the use of alternative-fuel/electric vehicles will create jobs in the Commonwealth and expand local businesses in the private sector. Lastly, this alternate fuel move will also give the Commonwealth the biggest chance to meet its goals.

More and more cities/states are seeing the benefits and practical sense of using alternative-fuel/electric vehicles.

Likewise, more and more car companies are participating in the assessment programs done in various cities all over the world to see how electric vehicles will par in everyday life. The use of such will also help in cleaning up the environment. It wouldn’t come as a surprise when one day, all of the public passenger vehicles will be powered with alternate fuel.

The Minister for Science and Technology announced the funding during the launch of the project held at the Institute for Marine Biosciences of the National Research Council.

Other organizations and industrial partners are also pouring financial support amounting to about C$1.2M plus some help in kind.

The initial stage of the project involves making a cultivation plant with a capacity of 50,000 liters along the Ketch Harbour. The algae will rely on carbon dioxide from combustion of fossil fuel to aid its growth.

Carbon2Algae, an industrial partner of the project, plants to setup photobioreactors of algae to capture the CO2 expelled by powerplants in Alberta which will allow the local algae to thrive.

In the future, it will be possible to operate an algae facility next to a generating plant using fossil fuel. The short term goal of the researchers will be to find the best species of algae that will be optimal for biofuel production.

Researchers in Nova Scotia have been growing and studying algae for more than five decades now. At the moment, they are looking into 64 species of algae which have already been collected. Twenty four of the specimens are being cultivated while six of these are under intensive scrutiny because of their impressive oil yields.