Renewing, Renewable Fuels and Chemicals

Batteries don't grow on trees, do they?

Since troglodytes roamed the planet hundreds of thousands of years ago we've been fascinated by burning "stuff"; a technique which has served us very nicely over the subsequent millennia. On the time scale of man-made fire, our obsession with combustion has only recently become a burning topic of debate with alternative technologies developed in the last half century. While solar, wind, wave and a plethora of other renewables will have a role to play in the future of local and global energy production, mankind will, for the foreseeable future at least, still be looking for something to pour into their internal combustion engines and a source for the chemicals from which to construct the world around them.

Monks, further ahead of the curve than BP.

One may imagine that renewable transportation fuels and the methods used to produce them are at the cutting edge of science; not so. Quite simply, production of bioethanol, perhaps the best known biofuel, is brewing, just on a massive scale. It has been suggested that alcohol was instrumental in establishing modern civilization as we know it. However, if we keep making it the same way as 9,000 years ago it may play a part in its downfall.

The basic premise that the CO2 released when plants are harvested is balanced out by the CO2 absorbed by the new ones planted to replace them holds true, to a certain extent. Conflict arises as the plants used in commercial biofuels factories such as; corn, sugar cane, oil seed rape and palm are either themselves food crops, compete for land with food crops or their planting leads to deforestation. The edible part of crop is used as the sugars, which ultimately end up as biofuel, are more accessible than in the rest of the plant; the equivalent of sucking on boiled sweet or chewing celery. The scientific advances in this field have focused around, higher yielding crops as well as more efficient, and therefore cheaper, processing. Despite the controversial production methods, Merrill Lynch calculate that without biofuels crude oil would be trading 15% higher and gasoline would be as much as 25% more expensive.

Rather depressing so far, however, all is not lost. Research is focusing on making biofuels from the non-edible parts of food crops or designated bioenergy crops that can be grown on land unsuitable for food production. These are known as lignocellulosic biofuels. Approximately 75% of these plants are made of sugar but locked away in a largely inaccessible form. The processes required to unlock these sugars mean that, currently, lignocellulosic biofuel production is more expensive than that from food crop sources. However, should science be able to overcome these problems the calculated green house gas savings are considerable. Maybe more importantly lignocellulosic biofuel production can grow within an ethical framework that considers protection of human rights and the environment. A future with Fairtrade biofuels?