Abstract
Life-cycle greenhouse gas (LC-GHG) emissions are a principal metric used by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to determine whether a biofuel qualifies under the U.S. EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2). This paper identifies important factors in the quantification of LC-GHG of algae-derived diesel, jet fuel, and gasoline, using hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) as a case study for algal biofuels. The results indicate that, under certain conditions, algae biofuels produced using HTL offer an over 50% reduction in LC-GHG emissions compared to their petroleum counterparts and would thus qualify as advanced biofuel and biomass-based biodiesel under RSF2. However, the results are sensitive to several upstream and downstream factors, specifically the CO2 supply chains used in feedstock production and the fuels that are produced using these algal feedstocks, respectively. Upstream processes for the production of algae include supplying gas or liquid phase CO2 to maintain culture viability, which is unlike ...
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