Image: Photograph by Levi Brown
In Brief
- Despite extensive research, biofuels are still not commercially competitive. The breakthroughs needed, revealed by recent science, may be tougher to realize than previously thought.
- Corn ethanol is widely produced because of subsidies, and it diverts massive tracts of farmland needed for food. Converting the cellulose in cornstalks, grasses and trees into biofuels is proving difficult and expensive. Algae that produce oils have not been grown at scale. And more advanced genetics are needed to successfully engineer synthetic microorganisms that excrete hydrocarbons.
- Some start-up companies are abandoning biofuels and are instead using the same processes to make higher-margin chemicals for products such as plastics or cosmetics.
More In This Article
Range fuels was a risky but tantalizing bet. The high-tech start-up, begun by former Apple executive Mitch Mandich, attracted millions of dollars in private money plus commitments for up to $156 million in grants and loans from the U.S. government. The plan was to build a large biofuels plant in Soperton, Ga. Each day the facility would convert 1,000 tons of wood chips and waste from Georgia’s vast pulp and paper industry into 274,000 gallons of ethanol. “We selected Range Fuels as one of our partners in this effort,” said Samuel Bodman, then secretary of energy, at the groundbreaking ceremony in November 2007, “because we really believe that they are the cream of the crop.”
That crop has spoiled in the ground. Earlier this year Range Fuels closed its newly built biorefinery without selling a drop of ethanol. Turning biomass into a commercially viable, combustible liquid is tougher than anticipated, the company has found. As expensive equipment sits idle, the firm is searching for more funding to try to solve the problem.
This article was originally published with the title The False Promise of Biofuels.
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32 Comments
Add CommentWhat about Robert Zubrin's methanol system? He claims it is easy to ferment methanol from any plant material. Methanol has none of the negatives of ethanol, such as the inability to run it through pipelines or mix it with gasoline at the refinery. However much alcohol is not a very good transportation fuel, if we have to live with it, then perhaps we picked the wrong alcohol to mandate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs long ago as 1974, Congressional investigations of alchohol production and use in gasoline blending were pessimistic. Yet, today's Congress approved subsidizing of ethanol production from corn. We forgot what was learned a generation ago and this article is substantiation of the initial pessimism. However, what is missing from the article is any mention of the current state of research on pyrolysis. It would seem to be a good approach for the wood waste in Georgia that is already reduced to small pieces. Mirrors could be used to help heat the digesters and reduce costs. Have we also forgotten the work done by the former Bureau of Mines and others?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe need to switch the most abundant energy source in the the universe: Hydrogen. http://www.cellaenergy.com/ have developed a viable solution that will work in existing internal combustion engines.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not a "Man-made Climate Change" advocate. However, I have a real problem with a statement made in this article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Because biofuels come from plants, which absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow, burning biofuels in vehicles would in theory slow the buildup of greenhouse gasses, compared with burning fossil fuels"
By converting the plants to ethanol one is essentially taking the plants out of the ecosystem, thereby stopping their full potential of absorbing the CO2 from the air. Then, in burning the ethanol, one is ADDING more CO2 into the air. As I see it there is no net loss of CO2 production. One could argue that there is a net INCREASE of CO2 production; disregarding any CO2 produced while converting the plants into ethanol.
I'm not a "Man-made Climate Change" advocate. However, I have a real problem with a statement made in this article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Because biofuels come from plants, which absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow, burning biofuels in vehicles would in theory slow the buildup of greenhouse gasses, compared with burning fossil fuels"
By converting the plants to ethanol one is essentially taking the plants out of the ecosystem, thereby stopping their full potential of absorbing the CO2 from the air. Then, in burning the ethanol, one is ADDING more CO2 into the air. As I see it there is no net loss of CO2 production. One could argue that there is a net INCREASE of CO2 production; disregarding any CO2 produced while converting the plants into ethanol.
This article completely ignores the energy contribution that the mega-scale cultivation of Cannabis sativa hemp could achieve for the biofuel market. If we stop the use of fossil fuels and use hemp hurds for an alternative energy feedstock we can provide a biofuel resource at a lower cost than corn. Energy PRODUCTION by all citizens would be carbon neutral, and we humans could repair the atmosphere by sequestering CO2 as hemp fibre for a cleaner industry. ( Oh and don't forget the seeds' nutritional value and the medical benefits of using Cannabis daily!)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere are the solutions for global energy, climate change, the alleviation of poverty and hunger, and achievement of economic equity, all rolled into one answer.
http://www.daggaparty.co.za/download/CBEE.PDF
The Cannabis Biomass Energy Equation : Part 2 of "THE REPORT. Cannabis: The Facts, Human Rights and the Law" by D'Oudney, K. and D'Oudney, J. SRC Publishing. ISBN 978-1-902848-20-4
This article completely ignores the energy contribution that the mega-scale cultivation of Cannabis sativa hemp could achieve for the biofuel market. If we stop the use of fossil fuels and use hemp hurds for an alternative energy feedstock we can provide a biofuel resource at a lower cost than corn. Energy PRODUCTION by all citizens would be carbon neutral, and we humans could repair the atmosphere by sequestering CO2 as hemp fibre for a cleaner industry. ( Oh and don't forget the seeds' nutritional value and the medical benefits of using Cannabis daily!)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere are the solutions for global energy, climate change, the alleviation of poverty and hunger, and achievement of economic equity, all rolled into one answer.
http://www.daggaparty.co.za/download/CBEE.PDF
The Cannabis Biomass Energy Equation : Part 2 of "THE REPORT. Cannabis: The Facts, Human Rights and the Law" by D'Oudney, K. and D'Oudney, J. SRC Publishing. ISBN 978-1-902848-20-4
The assertion that ethanol is a bust cannot be disputed. However, defining biofuel strictly as ethanol is a big mistake, albeit an honest one. There are two technologies, that when combined offer, $2/gal. ultra-pure biodiesel fuel from municipal and farm effluent with onsite production facilites. That biodiesel fuel is so pure it does not gel at 45F. Unfortunately, the $154M wasted on the ethanol plant went the way of "conventional wisdom" w/o much forethought. If we could get a few visionaries to step up to the plate, we could have the biodiesel from effluent via 1) the only patented and proven, indoor hydroponic algae farm for <$1.70/gal., and 2) a 96% efficient transformation of virtually any lipid, including algae, to biodiesel fuel in a process called "supercritical transesterification" that uses very high temperature and pressure to transform lipids to biodiesel in minutes instead of hours in a scalable system, obviating the need for transportation to an ethanol plant, with virtually no unwanted glycol by-products, at 1/2 the price ($0.26 /gal) of the current state-of-the-art. References: www.algepower.com (no "a") and Google supercritical transesterification, Dr. Lawrence Tavlarides, Dr. George Anitescu.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe algae farm 3 yr. pilot was supported by the VT Dept. of Agriculture and the numbers from this proof of concept have provided traction for moving forward. However, the "One Step to Biodiesel" needs to move out of the lab at the Syracuse University Chemical Engineering Department. The prototype will require approximately $1M in funding and 18 months time, due to the need for creating and bulletproofing an automated control system for the high temperatures and pressures.
Bolt these two technologies together and you get ultra-pure biodiesel from farms and municipal waste treatment plants anywhere in the world, while reducing pollution to the local watersheds.
Any leaders who can see past the next quarter are welcome to step up to the plate - now, please, before this bad rap for (ethanol) "biofuels" continues and gets further drummed into the public's mind, making the successful development of cost-effective and pollution-reducing biofuels even more difficult to succeed. Thank you. plusenergy01@gmail.com
The only meaningful gains in air quality and energy use in the last 35 years have been through advances in fossil fuel technoloy. these are advances in cleaner coal burning and advances in the icombustion engine.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInvestment in these areas will continue to yield by far more positive results than all the other 'feel good' sideshows combined.
Non-renewable fuel, peak-oil, Asian population & wealth growth - all meaningless phrases, right? Tunnel vision, that what keeps us doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease explain to me how "Corn ethanol is widely produced because of subsidies, and it diverts massive tracts of farmland needed for food". There is no food loss in the production of ethonal! The same amount of calories go out of the plant that go in. After the ethonal process is completed it is fed to cattle.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is misleading to suggest hydrogen is the most abundant fuel as the form in which it exists on the earth is not one that can be used as a fuel. To get hydrogen from water takes energy more than you will get out of it when you burn it due to the 2nd law of thermodynamics. So hydrogen is a energy storage medium not an energy provider. You still need an energy provider such as solar, wind, nuclear or fossil fuel. Saying hydrogen is a energy source is like saying batteries are an energy source.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@geojellybrains, "The only meaningful gains in air quality and energy use in the last 35 years have been through advances in fossil fuel" so it was in the past therefore it must be in the future. Do you even know what a logical fallacy is? Well unlike you scientists don't live their lives in the past. We move forward with new ideas and discoveries. Though I think it is a joke that you claim fossil fuels improved air quality. Perhaps in the cities but the world is paying a heavy price for "clean" urban air. Of course I know you have never let a trivial thing such as facts change you ideologically closed mind.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is you who are mistaken. Compare the pea soup fogs and mountains of horse manure that existed in cities such such as London or New York prior to advances in fossil fuel technology to those environments today.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGeojellyroll is spot on.
The recent idiocy surrounding fraccing is another transparent attempt by the eco-jihadists to pervert rules to continue their war on an element of the periodic table. It has nothing to do with air or water quality and has everything to do with their obsessive intolerant views of western civilization.
I don't believe this. The article simply ignores the biofuel from sugar cane. It is well established that alcohol from sugar cane is almost as cheap as oil. But it is much better because the cane grows with CO2 from atmosphere... It is amazing as the american press ignores - or tries to ignore - this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI likewise am not a proponent of biofuels especially when we use good farmland to fill our tanks and have starving people in all areas the world. It seems foolhardy. However, research should be funded and continued in hopes that a breakthrough can be made, but subsidies of existing production should cease and the facilities allowed to survive based on their own merit. The value of the food that the land can produce far exceeds the subsidized and thus negative value of current biofuel. Like Simon_B, use a cheap and green power source such a nuclear power to generate electricty in order to produce hydrogen. Fuel our vehicles with hydrogen and the emission will be water vapor.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe final answer is a no brainer:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1. Most homes could be generating solar hot water. New homes and integrated solar buildings should all be generating solar electricity . Incentives to return excess generation back into the grid should be made universal. No costly storage batteries are needed. Already, Australia pays 3x the cost of downloaded power, parts of the US 4x. and Germany a whopping 8x - where there is poor sunlight. This form of power generation also continues during disasters.
2 . Electric vehicles should be used for most travel, powered by home produced solar electricity. Forget charging stations, time is important. Battery exchange stations are already in operation in some countries. Electric vehicles will dramatically reduce energy consumption from fossil fuels, nuclear, hydro, wind, hydrogen and biofuels. Most of these are expensive, degrade the environment or consume agricultural land needed for food. Power from these sources should only be used as a supplement where solar generated power is unviable, such as aircraft, heavy vehicles and seagoing vessels.
3. Sunlight is free. The above would dramatically reduce energy needs and costs from other sources, along with international tensions. And hopefully, wars over increasingly scarce "traditional" resources.
4. But, dare I say it,there must also be incentives to reduce human population growth. No matter what we do, this is the elephant in the room which nobody wants to confront. If we don't come to our senses, it will finally spell the end of the reign of homo sapiens on our beautiful but increasingly stressed planet.
The whole concept of biofuels is nonsense. It would only be sensible if they were cheaper than oil. They aren't.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBiofuels make virtually no reduction to carbon dioxide emissions. And even if they did, it wouldn't matter, because nobody has proved conclusively that carbon dioxide contributes to dangerous global warming (climate models that have proved to be wrong for the last 10 or more years are not “proof"). Evidence from the sunspot cycle tells us that the chances are the world is headed for a cooling phase.
The world has more energy resources available to it now than it ever has had in the past. What it lacks is a determination to use nuclear power and an unreasonable fear of oil well drilling which, at its worst, is less damaging than, for instance, mining coal or even hydropower.
Finally, even if biofuels were economic, they would demand so much of the agricultural land in the world that it would cause major food shortages. Which would push up the price of the feedstock and make biofuels uneconomic. Like wind and solar power, it is a scam promoted by those seeking subsidies.
Using a renewable resource such as Hydrogen for the modern world's energy needs makes perfect sense, but what a lot of people don't realize is that whatever is being used, (or is going to be used) must not only make sense from a technological point of view, but also who controls its production and access, and whether it satisfies the requirements of those who will control it. Fossil fuels are entrenched, embedded and intertwined into as many facets of life on this planet as possible in order to perpetuate it for the benefit of those who control it. Fossil fuels have the kind of staying power to perpetuate itself this way. Do any renewable resources have that? Any serious discussion of which renewable resource is more or less technologically viable or advantageous, must necessarily also deal with those issues.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs Brazil's sugarcane ethanol also subsidized? Waste biomass can be turned into biofuel. You can extract methane from sewage water and solid municipal waste via anaerobic digestion that uses bacteria to do the trick. That methane can be liquified and used in internal combustion engines. This is the same as LNG (liquified natural gas).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you don't like biofuels, ammonia is another alternative fuel. You can make ammonia by getting H2 from water via electrolysis and combining it with N2 from air via the Haber process. That's how you create fuel from water and air. Of course you need energy input to do the trick. But ammonia is cheaper than gasoline and it can power internal combustion and rocket engines.
Ethanol production is clearly in difficulty. Methane production is more successful, but fermentation is a very slow process requiring vast volumes of reactors. The Simple solution is Biomass pyrolysis, which requires no catalysts or bacteria. Put biomass in and heat it, get gas and biochar out. Use the gas to get electricity and the biochar to sequester carbon in soils which then give greater yields. See www.eprida.com
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHydrogen is storage not fuel. Unless you have discovered an accessible source of molecular H<sub>2</sub> that everyone else has missed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe calories in the ethanol have been removed from the food stream and moved to the fuel stream. The leftover dross used as animal foodstock has less total caloric content than the feedstock put into the ethanol plant.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe problem with pyrolysis is it requires a lot of energy input. You need to heat the biomass above 450C to get gas and biochar. It's like baking a block of wood until it turns into charcoal. Imagine how much heat you need to do that vs. the heat you will get when you burn the residual charcoal and gases.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnaerobic digestion requires less energy input because the bacteria are doing the work to break down the chemical structure of the biomass. It is a proven technology with large scale application. UK's anaerobic digesters produce 80 MW.
Btw, H2 can be extracted from water by electrolysis.
Yes, ethanol removes calories from the feedstock. But it only removes starch and sugars which have no nutritional value to mammals. The proteins and other nutrients are intact plus some yeast is added. Studies have demonstrated that feeding DG to dairy cows *increases* milk output by 16% with the same original corn input.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFossil fuels, by definition, are a finite resource. Biofuels can be a self-replenishing resource. Why wouldn't we pursue it?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy do we continue to devote time, energy and talent at developing more and more esoteric, expensive ways to release long sequestered carbon deposits into the carbon cycle?
Many are concerned about the energy balance of producing biofuels. What is the energy "balance" of fossil fuels? The energy potential of fossil fuels is the same in the ground as in the tank but how much energy is consumed getting it into the tank?
This biofuels thing was fed by the corn growers and global warming people from the beginning -- a collaboration between profit-hungry investors and power-hungry ideologues. The government was stupid enough to grant subsidies and now there are redundant ethanol plants all around the midwest. Biofuels were a stupid idea from the getgo.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNeither solar nor wind power is living up to our hopes, either. Wind power is unpredictable, has all kinds of other issues like whacking birds, and hasn't found much of a market in the U.S. Solar power has the same issue of predictability and is far too expensive to install and maintain for high level use. It would take an acre of solar panels to run an ordinary house if you factor in heat and airconditioning. Domestic solar and wind power manufacturers are being driven out of business by the Chinese anyway. No jobs for Americans there.
Let it go and get used to the idea of nuclear power. The new plants are safe and reliable, they provide jobs for Americans and help to free us from oil addiction.
Last year, ethanol only produced 9% of foreign oil imports. It is impossible for biofuels to replace foreign oil because of limited crop land in the United States. This is easily calculated with a stubby pencil by any unscientific American (yield times crop land), but liberal politicians crammed biofuel down our throats by mandating its use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUsing ethanol emits more carbon dioxide into the air than using gasoline. That is a scientific fact which shows that our current energy policy conflicts with our current climate policy. Yet, the current administration ignores this conflict.
Dr Strangelove : Yes you do have to heat biomass to start the reaction, but then it maintains itself. The temperature you quote is too high. 330° is optimal. The biochar is buried, not burnt, thereby sequestering carbon, which should generate carbon credits. Hydrogen is produced, which can generate electricity. When the ton of carbon dioxide is traded at a more realistic price, Biomass pyrolysis will be widespread. At present it is only economical with sewerage sludge as free feedstock.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne of the major costs associated with bioethanol is the distillation of the alcohol from water. This energy requirement can be met at many manufacturing facilities that generate excess/waste low pressure steam. Paper mills are an example of such a facility, suggesting that ethanol fermentation may be sited near such facilities to take advantage of unused energy sources.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMore bioethanol with yeasts?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article of David Biello shows that the massive production of biofuels of second generation remains uncertain.
The ethanol fuel is now produced by sugar fermentation. Perhaps a cheap evolution of this technique of fermentation could increase the production of ethanol.
A part of ethanol fuel is produced by a discontinuous process. The digestion of sugar by yeasts is done in large industrial bioreactors. When the totality of sugar is digested, the yeasts are recovered to treat the next batch. Produced alcohol is concentrated by distillation.
It seems to me that this discontinuous process could be used for an experiment to obtain bioethanol with cellulose. Because of this discontinuous operation, the yeasts are submitted to a food stress when the digestion of sugar is finished. This state of stress is favourable to impose a controlled evolution on yeasts.
The technique of controlled evolution combines stress and food to obtain a genetic transformation of a biological strain. This process has already obtained the evolution of bacteria for the digestion of organochlorinated compounds that, normally, are not degraded by bacteria. The bacteria, put in a state of food stress and in the presence of organochlorinated compounds, developed a capacity to digest these compounds.
The controlled evolution applied to yeasts can begin by the addition in an industrial bioreactor producing ethanol a small amount of cellulosic material. The food stress that the yeasts endure when they digested the most part of sugar could make them develop a capacity to hydrolyze cellulose.
The hydrolysis of cellulose is made via several enzymes named cellulases. A study published in may 2008 (*) has shown the presence of genes coding several cellulases in the genetic code of Sacchromyces Cerevisiae, the yeast used for the production of bioethanol. The goal of the controlled evolution is to push the expression of these genes coding cellulases.
The great volume of industrial bioreactors is a favourable factor for the evolution of yeasts. The probability of a genetic mutation of yeasts is proportional to the amount of yeasts submitted to the experiment, and this amount is much greater in industrial bioreactor than in a laboratory bioreactor.
The cost of this experiment could be moderate because it could be inserted in the normal process of production of bioethanol:
- at the start of fermentation, a small amount of cellulosic material is added in the bioreactor with the sugar and the yeasts,
- at the end of fermentation, yeasts and the no digested cellulosic material are recovered by filtration, whereas a distillation concentrates the produced ethanol,
- yeasts are used to treat the following batch of sugar, the presence of cellulosic material in the broth maintains the genetic pressure on yeasts.
By this cheap experiment on the industrial production of bioethanol, a slow evolution toward a cellulosic biofuel becomes possible.
(*) : Genome sequencing and analysis of the biomass-degrading fungus Trichoderma reesei, Nature Biotechnology, Volume 26, Number 5, May 2008.
Harvesting plants (for food or fuel or any other purpose) does not "remove" them from the ecosystem - by burning it or digesting it, we are effectively returning the carbon from whence it originally came (i.e. the atmosphere, since the plants pulled the CO2 out to make the carbohydrates that constitute it).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn contrast, fossil fuels represent carbon that was previously "locked" out of the ecosystem by being buried in the ground. By mining/pumping the coal or crude oil up, and then burning it, we are effectively releasing it, and adding to the burden of carbon to the carbon cycle.