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[Due to the increasing size of the archives, each topic page now contains only the prior 365 days of content. Access to older stories is now solely through the Monthly Archive pages or the site search function.]
EPA finds that both biodiesel and renewable diesel from palm oil fail to meet GHG reduction threshold for RFS program
January 27, 2012
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| Simplified palm oil biofuel lifecycle system diagram. Source: EPA. Click to enlarge. |
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has conducted lifecycle greenhouse gas (GHG) analyses on biodiesel and renewable diesel produced from palm oil and estimated GHG emission reductions of 17% (81 (kgCO2e/mmBtu) and 11% (87 (kgCO2e/mmBtu) respectively for these biofuels compared to the statutory baseline (97 (kgCO2e/mmBtu) petroleum-based diesel fuel used in the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) program.
Consequently, neither palm oil-based biofuel qualifies as meeting the minimum 20% greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction performance threshold required for renewable fuel under the RFS program. EPA has published a Notice of Data Availability (NODA) on this to provide an opportunity to comment on the analyses.
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EPA finalizes 2012 Renewable Fuel Standards; cellulosic biofuels category comes in at 0.006%
December 27, 2011
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized the 2012 percentage standards for four fuel categories that are part of the agency’s Renewable Fuel Standard program (RFS2). (Earlier post.) The final 2012 overall volumes and standards are:
- Biomass-based diesel (1.0 billion gallons; 0.91%)
- Advanced biofuels (2.0 billion gallons; 1.21%)
- Cellulosic biofuels (8.65 million gallons; 0.006%)
- Total renewable fuels (15.2 billion gallons; 9.2%)
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Shell exec says biofuels are the most important alternative to fossil hydrocarbons in mobility for the next 20 years
November 14, 2011
In a keynote interview to open F.O. Licht’s World Ethanol & Biofuels in Barcelona on 8 November, Arthur Reijnhart, General Manager, Alternative Energies and Fuel Development Strategy for Shell, described a scenario of an increasingly diverse energy supply landscape against a backdrop of soaring demand between now and 2050, driven by population growth, increasing incomes and increasing urbanisation of the world’s population.
Reijnhart said that fossil fuels will be harder and more expensive to get, given that new oil and gas reserves are likely to be found under ice caps, deeper under the sea or under difficult political conditions. Shell’s view is that the 3% of energy for mobility from alternative sources will increase to up to 30% after 2030, with the increase coming from a portfolio of products.
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Study finds GHG emissions associated with palm oil production have been significantly underestimated; implications for carbon intensity of biofuels as well as biofuel policies in Europe
November 04, 2011
A new study on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with the conversion and degradation of peatland in palm oil plantations in Southeast Asia has determined that past studies have generally significantly underestimated emissions associated with palm oil grown on peatland. This has resulted in underestimation of the indirect land use change emissions from many biofuels derived from palm oil, the study concluded.
The study led by a team from the University of Leicester (UK) suggested that 86 Mg CO2-eq ha-1 yr-1 (over 50 years) or 100 Mg CO2-eq ha-1 yr-1 (over 25 years) represent the best available estimates of typical emissions from peat decomposition in palm plantations.
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Pennsylvania DEP awards more than $4.4M in alternative fuels grants to 12 projects; bulk for natural gas
October 26, 2011
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) will award more than $4.4 million in Alternative Fuels Incentive Grants to 12 projects across the state. The bulk of the funding is flowing to natural gas projects, with additional funding for electric vehicle infrastructure and a biodiesel project.
The grants, funded by a portion of the state’s annual utilities gross receipts tax, are intended to encourage new markets for alternative fuels, fleets and technologies across Pennsylvania. The projects are:
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Pike Research forecasts global biofuels market value to double to $185B by 2021
October 13, 2011
According to a new report from Pike Research, the increased production and consumption of biofuels will more than double the industry’s market value in the next decade. Pike forecasts that the global market for biofuels will increase from $82.7 billion in 2011 to $185.3 billion by 2021.
Pike projects that by 2021, the production of biofuels derived from a range of feedstocks will reach 65.7 BGPY worldwide, representing a 127% increase over 2010 production volumes and an 8.4% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) between 2011 and 2021. A more robust growth is expected between 2017 and 2021, as a combination of higher oil prices, emerging mandate obligations, availability of new feedstocks, and the scaling up of advanced technologies drive increased investment in the industry, the report finds.
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Global biofuels production up 17% in 2010 to hit all-time high of 105 billion liters
August 31, 2011
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| World ethanol and biodiesel production, 1975-2010. Source: Worldwatch Institute. Click to enlarge. |
Global production of biofuels increased 17% in 2010 to reach an all-time high of 105 billion liters (28 billion gallons US), up from 90 billion liters (24 billion gallons US) in 2009. High oil prices, a global economic rebound, and new laws and mandates in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, China, and the United States, among other countries, are all factors behind the surge in production, according to research conducted by the Worldwatch Institute’s Climate and Energy Program for the website Vital Signs Online.
Biofuels provided 2.7% of all global fuel for road transportation—an increase from 2% in 2009, according to the report. The two biofuel alternatives to fossil fuels for transportation largely consist of ethanol and biodiesel. The world produced 86 billion liters (23 billion gallons US) of ethanol in 2010, 18% more than in 2009. World biodiesel production rose to 19 billion liters (5 billion gallons US) in 2010, a 12% increase from 2009.
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Petrobras to invest US$2.5 billion in increasing biodiesel and ethanol production through 2015
August 12, 2011
Brazil’s Petrobras, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Petrobras Biocombustível, will invest US$2.5 billion in increasing biodiesel and ethanol production between 2011 and 2015. This amount is part of $4.1 billion earmarked for the biofuels business, which also foresees $1.3 billion for ethanol logistics and $300 million for research in this segment. Petrobras’ Business Plan calls for total investments in the order of $224.7 billion in the next five years.
Increasing ethanol production will be a priority, and receive a total of $1.9 billion of the investments (76% of the amount set aside for production). Together with partners, the goal is to reach a volume of 5.6 billion liters (1.5 billion gallons US) in 2015, or a 12% national market share. This will ensure the company the leading position in the domestic market.
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Researchers castigate planning bodies for ill-conceived Jatropha programs
August 03, 2011
The results of massive plantings of Jatropha worldwide for use as a biofuel feedstock—some 12.8 million ha (49,421 square miles) are expected to be planted by 2015—are “anything but encouraging”, according to Promode Kant from the Institute of Green Economy in India and Shuirong Wu of the Chinese Academy of Forestry.
In a Viewpoint published in the ACS journal Environmental Science & Technology, Kant and Wu suggest that what they call the “extraordinary collapse of Jatropha as a biofuel” appears to be due to “an extreme case of a well intentioned top down climate mitigation approach, undertaken without adequate preparation and ignoring conflict of interest, and adopted in good faith by other countries, gone awry bringing misery to millions of poorest people across the world”.
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Updated energy life-cycle assessment of soybean biodiesel finds fossil energy ratio of 5.54; significant improvement from earlier studies
July 27, 2011
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| Comparing energy requirements for major biodiesel subsystems and total life-cycle energy requirements between the current study and two earlier assessments: Pradhan et al. (2009), and Sheehan et al. (1998). Pradhan et al. (2011) Click to enlarge. |
Researchers from the University of Idaho and the US Department of Agriculture have updated the analysis of the energy life-cycle of soybean biodiesel and found a fossil energy ratio (FER) of 5.54 using 2006 agricultural data. This marks a major improvement over the FER of 3.2 reported in a 1998 NREL study that used 1990 agricultural data and significantly better than the FER of 4.56 later reported using 2002 data.
The FER is the ratio of renewable fuel energy output to the biodiesel share of fossil energy input; only fossil (nonrenewable) energy is included in the input. The improvements are primarily due to improved soybean yields and more energy-efficient soybean crushing and conversion facilities, the team said.
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UW-Madison Hybrid Vehicle Team working with Engine Research Center to apply dual-fuel RCCI engines in series and parallel hybrids
July 23, 2011
The University of Wisconsin-Madison Hybrid Vehicle Team will work with the UW-Madison Engine Research Center to test implementations of Reactivity Controlled Compression Ignition (RCCI) engines being developed by UW mechanical engineering professor Rolf Reitz and his colleagues.
RCCI is a dual-fuel compression-ignition engine low-temperature combustion (LTC) strategy that uses in-cylinder fuel blending with at least two fuels of different reactivity (e.g., diesel and gasoline) and multiple injections to control in-cylinder fuel reactivity to optimize combustion phasing, duration and magnitude. RCCI results in efficient, premixed-charge combustion with near zero levels of NOx and soot. (Earlier post.)
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Wärtsilä supplying liquid bio-fuel powered main engines for new Finnish cargo vessel
July 03, 2011
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| Wärtsilä’s LBF specification. Click to enlarge. |
Wärtsilä was recently contracted by the STX Finland shipyard in Turku, Finland, to supply the main engines for a new multi-purpose cargo vessel. The vessel will be powered by three Wärtsilä 6L20 main generating sets, capable of operating on various types of liquid bio-fuels (LBF) fulfilling Wärtsilä’s liquid bio-fuel specification.
Wärtsilä’s engine technology offers flexibility which enables switching of fuels without any interruption in operation should the need arise. This will be the first installation in which a European commercial shipping operation is going to permanently use LBF as fuel. The liquid bio-fuel is produced at the ship owner’s process refinery in Uusikaupunki, on the south-west coast of Finland.
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EPA proposes 2012 Renewable Fuel Standards, 2013 biomass-based diesel volume
June 21, 2011
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed the 2012 percentage standards for four fuel categories that are part of the agency’s Renewable Fuel Standard program (RFS2). The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA) established the annual renewable fuel volume targets, which steadily increase to an overall level of 36 billion gallons in 2022.
To achieve these volumes, EPA calculates a percentage-based standard for the following year. Based on the standard, each refiner, importer, and non-oxygenate blender of gasoline or diesel determines the minimum volume of renewable fuel that it must ensure is used in its transportation fuel. The proposed 2012 overall volumes and standards are:
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Study finds renewable fuels from hydrotreated vegetable oils outperform transesterified lipids and BTL from woody material in environmental lifecycle impacts and costs
June 03, 2011
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| GHG emission comparison between fossil diesel, transesterified lipids, HVO and woody BTL. GD = HVO; RSO = Rapeseed Oil; SBO = Soybean oil; Biodiesel = Transesterified lipids. Sunde et al. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers in Norway reviewing the lifecycle impacts and costs of three renewable fuels—(1) transesterified lipids, (2) hydrotreated vegetable oils (HVO), and (3) woody biomass-to-liquid (BTL) Fischer-Tropsch diesel—and feedstocks found that HVO made from wastes or by-products such as tall oil, tallow or used cooking oil outperform transesterified lipids and BTL from woody material in both areas.
However, because those feedstocks are limited, to produce larger volumes of biofuels other raw materials must also be used, Kathrin Sunde from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and her colleagues noted in their open access paper published in the journal Energies. To expand biofuel production and use, they found that the next preferable feedstock is likely residual woody biomass for BTL.
