{"id":120503,"date":"2016-04-07T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-04-07T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/les-biocarburants-dans-lattente-de-nouvelles-generations\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T17:48:42","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T16:48:42","slug":"les-biocarburants-dans-lattente-de-nouvelles-generations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/les-biocarburants-dans-lattente-de-nouvelles-generations\/","title":{"rendered":"Biofuels\u2014Looking to New Generations to Come On-Stream"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Fuels derived from oil (petrol and diesel) remain essential for transport, but agricultural countries like France have begun the production of biofuels (ethanol and esters) from renewable biomass, in order to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Almost all of world production today (70 megatonnes oil equivalent, Mtoe) is provided by the first generation of biofuels: bioethanol (75 % of global production), produced from cereal starch derived from plants such as maize, sugar beet and sugar cane; biodiesel (25%) from vegetable oils, such as rapeseed or sunflower oil. These are mixed, in the one case, with petrol, in the other with diesel. A second generation using ligno-cellulosic biomass is currently being developed.<\/h6>\n\n\n

In a report published in 2016, the French government’s Accounting Office (la Cour des comptes) made an assessment of the biofuels industry in France, finding that production in 2015 stood at 0.6 Mtoe of ethanol and 1.7 Mtoe of biodiesel and occupied some 6 % of agricultural land; it had been stagnant at that level for five years.[1]<\/a><\/sup> Only if it uses biofuels will France be able to achieve the objectives of the EU Climate-Energy Plan (10% of renewable energy in the transport sector by 2020), since the contribution made by electric vehicles will be insufficient.<\/p>\n\n\n

The reduction of CO2<\/sub> emissions by substituting biofuels for fossil fuels (in theory they emit 35% less CO2<\/sub>) remains controversial, but the Accounting Office notes that the EU has imposed a ceiling for the incorporation of first generation biofuels into fossil fuels: this is 7% in LHV (lower heating value), which translates to 7.6 % by volume for esters and 10 % for ethanol in petrol (the unleaded fuel SP95 E10). The Accounting Office then makes an observation: French incorporation rates (respectively, 8% and 10.6% by volume for biodiesel and ethanol) are currently higher than the European standards; it will, therefore, be difficult to achieve the objective of the Energy-Climate Plan with the first generation of biofuels. Short of increasing the rates of incorporation into petrol and diesel (E85, a fuel with 85% ethanol, would be a solution, but engines would need to be adapted for it), we shall have to have recourse to second-generation biofuels-which have not yet been perfected-and, later, to a third generation produced from algae.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Accounting Office notes that the partial exemption of biofuels from the TICPE (the French internal consumption tax on energy products) has played an incentivizing role. However, as that exemption has no longer applied since January 2016, drivers are now wholly financing the support for the biofuels industry (the energy yield of biofuels is lower than that of fossil fuels, which leads to additional consumption that adds to tax revenues). Moreover, failure on the part of distributors to meet the standards for the incorporation of biofuels into petrol and diesel is penalized by the TGAP tax (a general tax on polluting activities). The Office advocates state action to make vehicle makers adapt their engines to fuels with a high concentration of ethanol and the setting of more ambitious European targets for the post-2020 period. A new first-generation biodiesel has recently made its appearance in the form of HVO (Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil), which consists of hydrogenated esters. This is a fuel produced from vegetable oils (rapeseed oil and, most importantly, imported palm oil) which can be used directly in an engine (the C<\/em>O2<\/sub> impact is significant when it is produced from palm oil). The Office stresses there is a risk that its use may destabilize France’s biofuels industry, which is one component of its agricultural policy.<\/p>\n\n\n

Though the biofuels market is under pressure all over the world, production in the USA, the world leader, has not fallen. Iowa, the leading state for the production of ethanol from maize (a quarter of all production), further increased its yields in 2015, but the market is suffering from the fall in the price of the barrel of oil: bioethanol is no longer competitive. The-more expensive-production of second-generation ethanol (from maize stalks) is proving slow to take off, whereas diesel produced from HVO is also just beginning to break through. American producers are encouraging the government and Congress to raise the targets for ethanol production and for its incorporation into petrol, which is capped at 57 billion litres (136 billion in 2022, 60 billion of this to be cellulosic ethanol).[2]<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n

The second generation of biofuels, produced from an agricultural raw material not intendedt for the human food chain (agricultural and forest residues, stems and stalks, grasses), is struggling to achieve a breakthrough (the aim of the Futurol project in France). High-temperature pretreatment of biomass is needed to separate lignin (a polymer) from cellulose (chains of glucose), and this consumes energy. One possible way forward might be to reduce the proportion of lignin in the plants: recent research at Berkeley has made it possible to genetically modify the production of an enzyme in a plant cell which ‘synthesizes’ less lignin.[3]<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n

The pilot plant of the (second-generation) Futurol project at Bazancourt-Pomacle<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A third generation of biofuels, produced from algae, an important source of lipids that can be esterified to produce biodiesel, is still at the R&D stage. A report by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre shows that, though the industry shows promise (according to the French Marine Research Institute, fat production yields of between 20,000 and 60,000 litres of oil per hectare, which is ten times the yield of palm oil), it is a long way from being operational.[4]<\/a><\/sup> The biomass is made up of either macroalgae (seaweed) or microalgae (there are between 40,000 and 100,000 strains of the latter!) and a priority of the R&D phase is to select the strains that are most productive in lipids. Growing conditions have to be optimized by adding light, nutrients and CO2<\/sub> (where they are grown in artificial environments) and by reducing energy consumption during cultivation and harvesting.<\/p>\n\n\n

Combining cultivation in ponds, dedicated to the production of biofuels and of by-products for use in aquaculture-or of glycerol-with windfarms would increase the profitability of the production systems. Japan, which has a high level of expertise in this field, is planning to produce biodiesel from algae. The Japanese aviation company ANA is set to try out a kerosene blended with 10% of an algae-based biofuel produced by the Euglena company in Yokohama.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Biofuels are in a phase of uncertainty that will only be overcome when the new generation of products are operational on a sound economic footing. This requires an intensification of the R&D effort.<\/p>\n\n\n

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  1. \n

    ‘Les biocarburants: des r\u00e9sultats en progr\u00e8s, des adaptations n\u00e9cessaires’, in Le Rapport public annuel 2016. Tome II: L’organisation, les missions, les r\u00e9sultats<\/em> (Paris: Cour des comptes, February 2016), pp. 201-238. URL: https:\/\/www.ccomptes.fr\/content\/download\/89516\/2121237\/version\/1\/file\/04-biocarburants-RPA2016-Tome-2.pdf<\/a>. Consulted 6 April 2016. \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  2. \n

    Brown Bill and Radich Tony, ‘New Biofuels Eliminate Need for Blending with Petroleum Fuels’, EIA (U.S. Energy Information Administration), 9 November 2015. URL: https:\/\/www.eia.gov\/todayinenergy\/detail.cfm?id=2369<\/a> \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  3. \n

    KROTZ Dan, ‘New Way to Reduce Plant Lignin Could Lead to Cheaper Biofuels’, Berkeley Lab, 23 February 2016. URL: http:\/\/newscenter.lbl.gov\/2016\/02\/23\/cheaper-biofuels\/<\/a>. Consulted, 6 April 2016.\u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  4. \n

    Rocca Stefania et al., ‘Biofuels from Algae: Technology Options, Energy Balance and GHG Emissions. Insights from a Literature Review<\/em> [JRC<\/em> Science for Policy Report]’<\/em> (Brussels: European Commission Joint Research Centre,<\/em> 2015), 89 pp. URL: http:\/\/publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu\/repository\/bitstream\/JRC98760\/algae_biofuels_report_21122015.pdf<\/a> \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Fuels derived from oil (petrol and diesel) remain essential for transport, but agricultural countries like France have begun the production of biofuels (ethanol and esters) from renewable biomass, in order to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Almost all of world production today (70 megatonnes oil equivalent, Mtoe) is provided by the first generation of biofuels: bioethanol … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":8459,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"both","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":301,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[140],"tags":[202],"keyword":[1307,1294],"class_list":["post-120503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newswatch","tag-environnement-en","keyword-agroeconomie-en","keyword-sources-d-energie-renouvelables-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120503"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120529,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120503\/revisions\/120529"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120503"},{"taxonomy":"keyword","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futuribles.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/keyword?post=120503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}