BIOFUELS

Introduction

Biofuels are biologically produced fuels, that is, fuels created from biomass. Biomass is biological material such as plants, vegetable oil and animal fat. Biofuels consist of bioalcohols and? biodiesel.

 

Two of the most widely used biofuels are ethanol and biodiesel. Ethanol and biodiesel can both be used in vehicles. When used in vehicles, ethanol is blended with petrol whereas biodiesel is blended with diesel derived from crude oil.

Bioalcohols include ethanol, methanol, butanol and propanol. These can be used in vehicles when blended with regular petrol, and can totally replace petrol in certain vehicles. They are produced by fermentation of biomass high in carbohydrates and sugar. However, a new technology that uses enzymes to process biomass to create bioalcohol is expected to greatly increase bioalcohol production.

Biodiesel is a biofuel that can be used in diesel vehicles. It is produced from vegetable oil and animal fats. The vegetable oil used to produce the fuel can be waste cooking oil or unused oil. There are several processes by which biodiesel can be produced. The most common is the process of transesterification.

In recent years, interest in biofuels has increased significantly. Rising oil prices and the availability of new technology, along with other factors, have caused many governments to encourage biofuel use and production. Major vehicle makers have also announced plans to produce more cars that are able to run on high concentrations of bioalcohols.

From 2000 to 2005, world production of ethanol doubled. In the same period of time, biodiesel production quadrupled. It is likely that in the future, ethanol and biodiesel production will increase and the cost of oil will be substantially greater than that of biofuels, increasing the use of biofuels in our world.

SUPPLY and AVAILABILITY

Currently, ethanol and biodiesel contribute to 1 percent of the world’s liquid transport fuels.

In 2005, world ethanol production amounted to nearly 40000 million litres. Brazil, the world’s largest exporter of ethanol, produced 16500 million litres whereas the United States produced 16230 million litres. However, this number is expected to increase when the United States finishes constructing seven new ethanol plants.

In 2005, world biodiesel production amounted to over 3000 million litres. Germany, the world’s largest producer of biodiesel, produced 1920 million litres of biodiesel, while France produced 511 million litres. The total amount of biodiesel sold in the US was 283 million litres.

However, ethanol and biodiesel are still less available than other types of liquid transport fuels.

One reason is that costs of ethanol and biodiesel are largely not competitive with those of petrol and diesel. Biodiesel costs slightly more than diesel. However the volumetric efficiency of biodiesel is lower than than of diesel – hence a car needs more biodiesel than diesel to travel a distance.

Although ethanol costs less to produce than petrol, the cost of transporting ethanol is high as ethanol is easily contaminated. In addition, the volumetric efficiency of ethanol is also lower than that of petrol.

Another reason is that some vehicles cannot run on biofuels without modification. Biodiesel has solvent properties and the seals in some engines can be damaged by the use of biodiesel. Also, biodiesel can loosen fuel deposits in vehicles and these loosened deposits can clog up the system of a vehicle.

Use of ethanol is also limited as most vehicles can only use fuels with less that ten percent of ethanol. Most vehicles need to be adapted in order to be able to use fuels which contain more than ten percent of ethanol.

LEVEL OF TECHNOLOGY

The world's present interest in biofuels as an alternative energy source has been around for only a few decades. Hence, the technology used currently to create biofuels is still quite new. Biofuel critics maintain that the processes of making biofuels are inefficient and costly.

However, new designs and new processes are improving the efficiency of creating biofuels. For example, engineers have recently improved the process of creating ethanol. Their new design will increase the efficiency of existing processes and decrease the cost of producing ethanol.

However, biofuel production is still quite inefficient. Current technology will need to be improved on in order for biofuels to be widely used.

TRANSPORT AND ACCESSIBILITY

Ethanol and biodiesel are liquid fuels produced near the sources of biomass. Therefore, it is necessary to transport these fuels to consumers in cities.

Ethanol is mainly produced in Brazil and is cheaper than petrol when bought in Brazil. However, ethanol is expensive to transport as it becomes contaminated and unusable when it comes into contact with water. Therefore, transport costs hinder the widespread use of ethanol.

Biodiesel is easier to transport than ethanol as it is not so easily contaminated.

In ethanol-producing countries such as Brazil and America, ethanol can be bought at special filling stations. Ethanol filling stations are less common overseas, however, due to transportation problems. Ethanol is not very accessible to people of many other? countries

Biodiesel filling stations can be found not only in countries that produce biodiesel, but also in other countries. There are more biodiesel filling stations as compared to ethanol filling stations and hence biodiesel as more accessible to consumers.

GOVERNMENT POLICIES

Many governments have been receptive towards the use of biofuels. No government has banned the use of biofuels.

Recently, the United States government has been trying to increase the use of biofuels over fossil fuels. This is significant as the United States has the capacity to produce large amounts of biofuels.

ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS
The environmental advantages of using biofuels has been disputed. Some scientists have argued that the amount of energy it takes to produce biofuel is more than the energy that can be obtained from biofuel. However, others claim that that is untrue. In any case, as the technology used to produce biofuel improves, the efficiency of producing biofuels will increase.

Environmentalists also fear that as nations try to increase biofuel producton, forests will have to be cleared in order to make way for the growing of crops to produce biofuels. Deforestation has serious consequences including an increase in greenhouses gases.

FEASIBILITY

Owing to the fact that biofuels can replace the use of fossil fuels, and that they can be produced in large amounts at low costs competitive to those of fossil fuels, we feel that the use of biofuels is feasible. However, biofuels need to be better transported to consumers in order to achieve widespread use of biofuels.