Life-cycle analysis on biodiesel production from microalgae: Water footprint and nutrients balance

Yang, Jia; Xu, Ming; Zhang, Xuezhi; Hu, Qiang; Sommerfeld, Milton R.; Chen, Yongsheng

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2010.07.017

Cited by 691 publications

(284 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Algae derived biofuels do not directly displace or put market pressure on food crops, as do the production of biofuels derived from corn, soybean, or sugarcane. Furthermore, algae can be grown using different growth media including wastewater as well as brackish/saline water; the use of which has the capacity to substantially reduce the nutrient and water-footprint of microalgal fuels relative to traditional terrestrial biofeedstocks [47]. Algae can be grown in a semi-continuous to continuous manner, and thus do not require perennial harvesting such as other leading forms of biomass including poplar or perennial grasses.…”

Section: Legendmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design of Sustainable Biofuel Processes and Supply Chains: Challenges and Opportunities

et al. 2015

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Abstract:The current methodological approach for developing sustainable biofuel processes and supply chains is flawed. Life cycle principles are often retrospectively incorporated in the design phase resulting in incremental environmental improvement rather than selection of fuel pathways that minimize environmental impacts across the life cycle. Further, designing sustainable biofuel supply chains requires joint consideration of economic, environmental, and social factors that span multiple spatial and temporal scales. However, traditional life cycle assessment (LCA) ignores economic aspects and the role of ecological goods and services in supply chains, and hence is limited in its ability for guiding decisionmaking among alternatives-often resulting in sub-optimal solutions. Simultaneously incorporating economic and environment objectives in the design and optimization of emerging biofuel supply chains requires a radical new paradigm. This work discusses key research opportunities and challenges in the design of emerging biofuel supply chains and provides a high-level overview of the current "state of the art" in environmental sustainability assessment of biofuel production. Additionally, a bibliometric analysis of over 20,000 biofuel research articles from 2000-to-present is performed to identify active topical areas of research in the biofuel literature, quantify the relative strength of connections between various biofuels research domains, and determine any potential research gaps. OPEN ACCESSProcesses 2015, 3 635

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Section: Legendmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design of Sustainable Biofuel Processes and Supply Chains: Challenges and Opportunities

et al. 2015

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“…First generation bioethanol, such as that produced from corn in the USA and sugar-cane ethanol in Brazil, is now widely used (Yang et al 2011b) The energy balance of corn ethanol is probably marginal (Beal 2011) and it has been suggested that "at present, bioethanol produced from sugar-cane in Brazil is the only credible example of a biofuel that exhibits a significant net energy gain" (Walker 2010). Ethanol from sugar-cane has a reported energy return on energy investment (EROI) of between 1.25 -8 and corn ethanol between 1 -1.34 (Beal 2011;Clarens et al 2011;Mulder and Hagens 2008;Hall and Klitgaard 2012;Twidell and Weir 2006).…”

Section: Bioethanol Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Methods of energy extraction from microalgal biomass: a review

Milledge

Heaven

2014

Rev Environ Sci Biotechnol

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“…Several other studies have been conducted to determine the water intensity of algal biofuel production and the system boundaries used in each study vary [9,11,15,17,54,55]. Analogous to energy inputs, the water inputs for a production pathway include direct and indirect parts.…”

Section: Water Intensity Of Algal Biofuelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(1) using waste and recycled nutrients (e.g., waste water and animal waste) [11,15,[25][26][27][28]65,71,72]; (2) using waste heat and flue-gas from industrial plants [44,59], carbon in wastewater [28], or developing energy-efficient means of using atmospheric CO 2 ; (3) developing ultra-productive algal strains (e.g., genetically modified organisms) [73][74][75]; (4) minimizing pumping [58,76,77]; (5) establishing energy-efficient water treatment and recycling methods [55]; (6) employing energy-efficient harvesting methods, such as chemical flocculation [66,78,79], and (7) avoiding separation via distillation.…”

Section: Innovation Pathwaysmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comprehensive Evaluation of Algal Biofuel Production: Experimental and Target Results

et al. 2012

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Worldwide, algal biofuel research and development efforts have focused on increasing the competitiveness of algal biofuels by increasing the energy and financial return on investments, reducing water intensity and resource requirements, and increasing algal productivity. In this study, analyses are presented in each of these areas-costs, resource needs, and productivity-for two cases: (1) an Experimental Case, using mostly measured data for a lab-scale system, and (2) a theorized Highly Productive Case that represents an optimized commercial-scale production system, albeit one that relies on full-price water, nutrients, and carbon dioxide. For both cases, the analysis described herein concludes that the energy and financial return on investments are less than 1, the water intensity is greater than that for conventional fuels, and the amounts of required resources OPEN ACCESSEnergies 2012, 5 1944 at a meaningful scale of production amount to significant fractions of current consumption (e.g., nitrogen). The analysis and presentation of results highlight critical areas for advancement and innovation that must occur for sustainable and profitable algal biofuel production can occur at a scale that yields significant petroleum displacement. To this end, targets for energy consumption, production cost, water consumption, and nutrient consumption are presented that would promote sustainable algal biofuel production. Furthermore, this work demonstrates a procedure and method by which subsequent advances in technology and biotechnology can be framed to track progress.

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Life-cycle analysis on biodiesel production from microalgae: Water footprint and nutrients balance

Cited by 691 publications

References 28 publications

Design of Sustainable Biofuel Processes and Supply Chains: Challenges and Opportunities

Design of Sustainable Biofuel Processes and Supply Chains: Challenges and Opportunities

Methods of energy extraction from microalgal biomass: a review

Comprehensive Evaluation of Algal Biofuel Production: Experimental and Target Results

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