The main component in seaweed is carbohydrates. These offer very attractive benefits for processors due to the fact that they do not contain lignin or solid cellulose which makes processing this seaweed easier. The sugars which form the backbone of the seaweed have an additional value for several value extraction opportunities, such as alginates and carragenan. Some of these sugars such as mannitol have a market demand and some sugars can be fed into a fermentation process in which the microbes help generate new desired products like bio-ethanol, bio-plastics or biogas.
