Application of analytic hierarchy process in the selection of Botryococcus braunii cultivation technology for bio-crude oil production

Bio-crude oil is obtained through a thermochemical process of biomass and can be used to reduce the Indonesian government's dependence on fossil energy. A potential source of biomass that is generally used for bioenergy production is microalgae, with Botryococcus braunii as the promising type. In the conversion of microalgae into bio-crude, the cultivation section is among the units required. Therefore, this study aims to determine the most effective and optimal cultivation technology that can be applied to the bio-crude oil refinery plant. It was carried out at the cultivation simulation system in Cilacap, Central Java, Indonesia, using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method. The criteria used were the reactor land area requirement, energy consumption, water usage, cost, contamination risk, ease of scale-up, and adaptation ability to weather changes. Meanwhile, the proposed alternative systems were open raceway pond, flat-panel photo-bioreactor, hybrid, and membrane photo-bioreactor. The AHP results showed that the open raceway pond was selected for application in the bio-crude oil refinery process. The biomass production potential of B. braunii from the cultivation unit was 19.8795 ton/year/ha, which can be processed into 11.5301 ton of bio�crude oil with a high heating value (HHV) of 553,448.8 MJ.