The technologies for
production of bioethanol from sugars and starch have been refined and developed over the years, notably in Brazil and the US.
Professor Walton said: «The ability to ferment cellulose is important as it opens up new possibilities in the production
of bioethanol from sustainable sources.
Scientists from the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plant Cell Walls at the University of Adelaide have discovered that a variety of sorghum growing wild in Australia, Arun, has the potential to yield over 10,000
litres of bioethanol per hectare per year.
This dictates the minimum amount
of bioethanol required to be blended with gasoline and is currently set at 27 %.
We generate enough electricity to power a city the size of Peterborough; we produce up to 70 million litres
of Bioethanol annually; and used our topsoil to landscape the Olympic Park.»
«Biochemical processing» does not refer to anaerobic digestion or production
of bioethanol through fermentation
A common example is a vehicle that can accept gasoline mixed with varying
levels of bioethanol (gasohol).
To find out, Elliott Campbell, an environmental engineer at the University of California, Merced, and his colleagues carried out a life - cycle
analysis of bioethanol and bioelectric technologies.
It's true that those of us who think like this are in a minority, caught between those who don't worry about the environmental
costs of bioethanol and those who claim it is impossible to produce biofuels sustainably.
Studies suggest that use
of bioethanol produced from maize represents only a slight improvement in fossil fuel use efficiency over direct use of petroleum, while bioethanol produced from wood can improve energy efficiency by up to four times (NRDC, 2006).
In addition, the studies show, the amount of grain required for one
tank of bioethanol in a 4 × 4 SUV vehicle would feed one person for one year.
He describes most of the policies and legislation in place as being highly irrational; for example, he explains how Brazil, one of the few efficient
producers of bioethanol, faces huge markups in the U.S. and European Union - a consequence of prohibitive tariffs - while much less efficient corn ethanol - based technologies receive large government subsidies.
The
use of bioethanol and biodiesel in motor vehicles is a misguided attempt to save the climate.
Sugar cane has the advantage that, besides the sugar which is fermented to produce bioethanol the cellulosic component of the plant's stalk — known as bagasse — can also be used to provide energy for the
production of bioethanol, thus increasing overall energy efficiency.
That «offset» of unreleased CO2 is roughly double that
of bioethanol - powered cars.