What are Biofuels? Hey Engineering Lovers, we have some videos here on the channel that talk about a recent law, called the Future Fuel Law. The text establishes that the margin for mixing ethanol in gasoline will be from 22% to 27%, and could reach 35%.
Currently, the mixture can reach 27. 5%, with the minimum percentage being 18% ethanol. As for biodiesel, mixed with diesel of fossil origin at a percentage of 14% since March this year, from 2025 onwards a percentage point of mixture will be added annually until reaching 20% in March 2030.
Well, the pros and cons of this law we We've already talked about it, and anyone who wants to check it out just stay with us until the end and there will be a card for both videos. The focus here is to talk about biofuels, so let's go. One thing is certain: with the increasing number of vehicles on our streets, oil will become more expensive and more difficult to obtain in the coming decades.
That's why many people think the future lies in alternative fuels made from crops and waste. It is constantly linked as a way to reduce environmental impacts and global warming itself. But some critics think their environmental benefits are exaggerated and argue that by taking land that would otherwise be used to grow food, they could severely worsen poverty and hunger in developing countries.
But let's take a closer look at how biofuels work and consider some of the pros and cons, but first, what are biofuels? A fuel is something we burn to release energy in a chemical reaction called combustion, like the one on screen. The exact chemical reaction depends on which fuel you burn, but basically the same process is at work whether you burn natural gas in a central heating boiler, wood in a fire, gasoline in a car engine or coal in a thermal power plant.
Almost any carbon-based organic substance can be a fuel. Our most common fuels are things like coal, oil, gas, peat and wood. See that they are all made of hydrocarbons, which are molecules built from hydrogen and carbon atoms, and they are all derived from living things like dead plants or animals.
Strictly speaking, the word biofuel can mean any fuel made from living organisms or their waste, that is, most of our fuels today are biofuels. But we typically use the word "biofuels" in a much narrower sense to talk about liquid and gaseous fuels that come from crops or waste. The best-known biofuels are ethanol and biodiesel.
But are there only these two types? Are there no more? Well, biofuels are a hot environmental topic right now, but they've been around for many decades.
People who work with biofuels separate them from first, second and third generation to distinguish between traditional biofuels that we know and the more complex, more advanced and more efficient ones that are currently in development. First-generation biofuels include things like vegetable oil, biodiesel, ethanol and methanol. Ethanol and methanol are very strong alcohols made from sugar, wheat or corn in a process similar to brewing beer.
Vegetable oil is made from materials such as peanuts and soybeans, and can be burned directly as fuel, or can be turned into biodiesel. Second-generation biofuels are made by turning crops into liquid fuels using more sophisticated chemical processes and include things like BioHydrogen, which produces hydrogen made from crops and some types of mixed alcohols. They are generally more efficient than first-generation biofuels because they release more energy per volume, so you can go further with a tank full of them.
It also helps if you are growing crops to make fuels, because it means you have to grow fewer plants and use less land to produce the same amount of energy. Third-generation biofuels are much more advanced, and are made using oil produced from algae, grown in lagoons or closed reactors, which is refined to make conventional fuels such as biodiesel, methane, ethanol and so on. The big advantage of algae-derived fuels is that they don't require large amounts of agricultural land, but the big disadvantage is that they require a lot of water and fertilizers, which greatly increases the cost and environmental impact, potentially eliminating any benefits.
But generally speaking, is biofuel worth it? Does it make much of a difference? If you read the news, you'll see a lot of coverage about biofuels in recent years.
The basic idea is certainly very attractive, where instead of pumping oil out of the ground and shipping it around the world, we could produce biofuels from crops and waste. Organizations such as the International Energy Agency have highlighted that the use of biofuels has enormous potential. They published a paper in 2011 suggesting that biofuels could produce 27% of the world's total transportation fuel by 2050.
Such an ambitious project would need 100 million hectares of land, which would be approximately the land area of South Korea. Sound good? But there is another great benefit as well, because this would reduce total carbon dioxide emissions in the world, which is currently being identified as the main problem of global warming.
In theory, biofuels do not suffer from the same problem. When a tree grows, it absorbs carbon dioxide from the air and water from the soil, and uses sunlight to convert the carbon, hydrogen and oxygen in these molecules into the more complex carbohydrates like sugars and starches that it stores. This process is called photosynthesis and is a bit like combustion in reverse.
If we burn the tree for fuel at the end of its life, the combustion process releases exactly the same amount of carbon dioxide as the tree absorbed during its life. So, biofuels are, at least in theory, carbon neutral, because it would not add any carbon dioxide to the atmosphere or worsen global warming. So far we've only talked about good things, but is there anything bad about this biofuel?
If it were that simple, we would be growing biofuels like crazy and shifting half the planet to biofuel production tomorrow. But unfortunately, biofuels do have some drastic disadvantages. Imagine you're a farmer and you've heard great things about biofuels and how they can help save the planet, so you decide to convert all your fields to soybeans and produce biodiesel.
You will need energy to power your tractors to plant the fields, harvest them and more energy to transport the grains around the world. More energy will be needed to run the chemical plants that turn the grains into biodiesel, and even more will be needed to transport the finished biodiesel to the vehicles that use it. Using all that energy means burning fuel and releasing carbon dioxide.
You may be trying to help the planet reduce its carbon dioxide emissions, but you are actually generating a large amount of the gas you want to avoid by forgetting all the logistics of its production. This means that biofuels are not truly carbon neutral. According to research funded by the U.
S. Department of Energy, corn ethanol produces 19 to 48 percent fewer carbon dioxide emissions, while ethanol produced from cellulose can reduce emissions by up to 115 percent. But other studies have found that considering the entire biofuel production process can generate more carbon dioxide than the fuels themselves save, casting considerable doubt on whether some biofuels are worth growing.
In 2016, for example, The Guardian reported that palm oil biodiesel produces three times the emissions of fossil fuels, while soybean oil produces twice as many. One solution could be eco-labelling, in which suitably sustainable biofuels are certified by a trusted and independent third party. In May 2016, The New York Times reported that Pacific Biodiesel's Hawaii plant had become the first in the United States to receive a sustainability certificate from the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance.
Let's think about it like this. Relatively little land is needed for oil rigs and pipelines compared to the size of the vast underground oil fields they exploit, not least because many oil fields are offshore. The same is not true for biofuels, because enormous amounts of land are needed to grow crops.
One solution would be to plant a plantation on an old open-pit mine and harvest it to make biofuels. This way, an area that has already been degraded in the past would gain a new meaning and there would be a net benefit for the planet. But what if you cut down and burned a large area of rainforest to grow palm oil to make biodiesel?
Then you would literally be destroying the planet using the biofuel flag. You may think you are making "environmentally friendly biofuel", but you would be causing so much damage in the process that there could be an overall negative impact. This problem is already occurring in developing countries where forests are being cut down because they have no immediate financial value, to grow profitable plantations for biofuels.
And there is always the crucial question, fuel versus food? There is only a limited amount of land in the world, but the number of people each hectare needs to support is growing ever larger. As oil becomes more expensive, biofuels become more attractive for cultivation.
This means that farmers may find that they can earn more by growing biofuel crops than food crops, which could lead to food shortages and rising food prices. You sitting at home with your cell phone in your hand may not notice this shortage, but underdeveloped or developing countries will be most affected by any increase in the price of basic commodities, such as wheat. In our rush to use biofuels to tackle global warming, which is now one of the world's most urgent problems, it is possible that we could worsen hunger and poverty, which guess what, is another urgent problem in the world.
Of course, not everyone agrees with this assessment and there are some who think that biofuel cultivation could be a lifesaver for farmers in developed and developing countries. But in the midst of this tug of war of positive and negative points, is biofuel good or bad? If produced responsibly, biofuels can help us cut or neutralize carbon dioxide emissions to combat global warming.
But in the race for profit, there is a risk that they could lead to greater emissions and significant loss of biodiversity, worsening problems such as poverty and hunger in developing countries. With limited world resources and a growing global population, perhaps it makes more sense to try to decrease the energy consumption we use and reduce our dependence on cars than to simply replace oil with biofuels and continue as we are. Looking at all of this from a macro perspective, we are not trying to solve the problem, but rather, trying to exchange one input for another, so that we continue to be polluted in the same way.
Some scientists are calling for us to act quickly to reduce the impacts of global warming, and that's a good thing. But in the case of biofuels, perhaps it is better to take a step back to see the situation as a whole, and act more wisely. In our rush to protect the planet, we have to be absolutely sure that we are not helping to destroy it.
And as I always like to emphasize, there is no perfect solution, a single solution that will end all problems. What we need is a set of solutions, adding the positive points of each of these solutions and minimizing negative points. If you've come this far and liked the video, take the opportunity to subscribe, If you're not already subscribed, leave your like and turn on the notification bell.
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