Creating a sustainable future with Biofuels

The quest for sustainable and environment friendly energy sources has become the pressing need of the present. Declining petroleum reserves, worldwide demand for energy, and undesirable effects of greenhouse gas emissions have led to increased worldwide interests in biofuels. This has resulted in the enormous use of biofuels an alternative choice that can link energy security with environment conservation without essentially compromising with the nourishment of the people.

Biofuels, the sustainable energy system may be regarded as a cost-effective, trustworthy, and environmental friendly system that efficiently make use of local resources. Biofuels have additionally been lumped into first-, second- and third-generational categories. We use first-generation biofuels in our fuel tanks today. Biofuels are relatively similar to hydrocarbons and feature some of the similar emission problems like that of standard fossil fuels. Biofuels are an inexhaustible resource since the stock can be replenished through agriculture.

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What is Biofuels?

A biofuel is a  fuel  that is produced through contemporary processes from  biomass , rather than a fuel produced by the very slow geological processes involved in the formation of  fossil fuels , such as oil. Since  biomass  technically can be used as a fuel directly (e.g. wood logs), some people use the terms biomass and biofuel interchangeably. More often than not, however, the word biomass simply denotes the biological raw material the fuel is made of, or some form of thermally/chemically altered solid end product, like torrefied pellets or  briquettes .

The word biofuel is usually reserved for liquid or gaseous fuels, used for transportation. Drop-in biofuels are functionally equivalent to petroleum fuels and fully compatible with the existing petroleum infrastructure.

Biofuels produced from plants (i.e.  energy crops ), or from agricultural, commercial, domestic, and/or industrial wastes (if the waste has a biological origin). Renewable biofuels generally involve contemporary  carbon fixation , such as those that occur in  plants  or  microalgae  through the process of  photosynthesis . If the  biomass  used in the production of biofuel can regrow quickly, the fuel is generally considered to be a form of  renewable energy . The greenhouse gas mitigation potential of biofuel varies considerably, from emission levels comparable to fossil fuels in some scenarios to negative emissions in others.

The two most common types of biofuel are bioethanol (biopetrol) and biodiesel-
•  Bioethanol  is an  alcohol  made by  fermentation , mostly from  carbohydrates  produced in  sugar  or  starch  crops such as  corn ,  sugarcane , or  sweet sorghum .  Cellulosic biomass , derived from non-food sources, such as trees and grasses, is also being developed as a  feedstock  for ethanol production. Ethanol can be used as a fuel for vehicles in its pure form (E100), but it is usually used as a  gasoline   additive  to increase octane and improve vehicle emissions.

•  Biodiesel  is produced from oils or fats using  transesterification  and is the most common biofuel in the world. It can be used as a  fuel  for vehicles in its pure form (B100), but it is usually used as a  diesel  additive to reduce levels of particulates,  carbon monoxide , and  hydrocarbons  from diesel-powered vehicles.