Abstract
Terrestrial transport biofuels differ in their ability to replace fossil fuels. When both the conversion of solar energy into biomass and the life cycle inputs of fossil fuels are considered, ethanol from sugarcane and biodiesel from palm oil do relatively well, if compared with ethanol from corn, sugar beet or wheat and biodiesel from rapeseed. When terrestrial biofuels are to replace mineral oil-derived transport fuels, large areas of good agricultural land are needed: about 5x108 ha in the case of biofuels from sugarcane or oil palm, and at least 1.8-3.6x109 ha in the case of ethanol from wheat, corn or sugar beet, as produced in industrialized countries. Biofuels from microalgae which are commercially produced with current technologies do not appear to outperform terrestrial plants such as sugarcane in their ability to displace fossil fuels. Whether they will able to do so on a commercial scale in the future, is uncertain.
Highlights
Biofuels are promoted to displace fossil fuels
Chisti [2] has argued that, in displacing fossil fuels, per Energies 2009, 2 hectare microalgae are about a factor of 9 better than terrestrial crops such as sugarcane
The view that algal biofuels are superior to terrestrial biofuels in the displacement of fossil fuels has wider support [3,4,5,6,7,8]
Summary
Biofuels are promoted to displace fossil fuels. ‘Energy security’ by the displacement of fossil fuels, has been a main driver in the expansion of transport biofuel production from terrestrial crops [1].Especially the increase of bioethanol production from Brazilian sugarcane and US corn can be traced back to energy security concerns [1]. For the purpose of analyzing the performance of microalgal and terrestrial transport biofuels in displacing fossil fuels, both the conversion of solar energy into biofuel and the life cycle inputs of fossil fuel into biofuel production will be considered. The input of fossil fuels into the biofuel life cycle will be used to correct the solar-energy-to-biofuel conversion efficiency.
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