What plants are used for making Bio fuel ?

Question

Just cuerious

Answer 1

Curiosity is good!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofuel

Biomass is material derived from recently living organisms. This includes plants, animals and their by-products. For example, manure, garden waste and crop residues are all sources of biomass. It is a renewable energy source based on the carbon cycle, unlike other natural resources such as petroleum, coal, and nuclear fuels. Agricultural products specifically grown for biofuel production include corn, switchgrass, and soybeans, primarily in the United States; rapeseed, wheat and sugar beet primarily in Europe; sugar cane in Brazil; palm oil and miscanthus in South-East Asia; sorghum and cassava in China; and jatropha in India. Hemp has also been proven to work as a biofuel. Biodegradable outputs from industry, agriculture, forestry and households can be used for biofuel production, either using anaerobic digestion to produce biogas, or using second generation biofuels; examples include straw, timber, manure, rice husks, sewage, and food waste. The use of biomass fuels can therefore contribute to waste management as well as fuel security and help to prevent climate change, though alone they are not a comprehensive solution to these problems.

First generation biofuels

'First-generation fuels' refer to biofuels made from sugar, starch, vegetable oil, or animal fats using conventional technology.[12]

The most common first generation biofuels are listed below...

Second generation biofuels

Main article: Second generation biofuels

Supporters of biofuels claim that a more viable solution is to increase political and industrial support for, and rapidity of, second-generation biofuel implementation from non food crops, including cellulosic biofuels.[20] Second-generation biofuel production processes can use a variety of non food crops. These include waste biomass, the stalks of wheat, corn, wood, and special-energy-or-biomass crops (e.g. Miscanthus). Second generation (2G) biofuels use biomass to liquid technology, including cellulosic biofuels from non food crops.[21] Many second generation biofuels are under development such as biohydrogen, biomethanol, DMF, Bio-DME, Fischer-Tropsch diesel, biohydrogen diesel, mixed alcohols and wood diesel.

Third generation biofuels

Main article: Algae fuel

Algae fuel, also called oilgae or third generation biofuel, is a biofuel from algae. Algae are low-input/high-yield (30 times more energy per acre than land) feedstocks to produce biofuels and algae fuel are biodegradable:

With the higher prices of oil, there is much interest in algaculture (farming algae).

One advantage of many biofuels over most other fuel types is that they are biodegradable, and so relatively harmless to the environment if spilled.

The United States Department of Energy estimates that if algae fuel replaced all the petroleum fuel in the United States, it would require 15,000 square miles (38,849 square kilometers), which is a few thousand miles larger than Maryland...

The 2007-12-19 U.S. Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 requires American “fuel producers to use at least 36 billion gallons of biofuel in 2022...

The European Union in its biofuels directive (updated 2006) has set the goal that for 2010 that each member state should achieve at least 5.75% biofuel usage of all used traffic fuel. By 2020 the figure should be 10%. As of January 2008 these aims are being reconsidered...

In 2008 a critical report by the Royal Society stated that biofuels risk failing to deliver significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from transport and could even be environmentally damaging...

The amount of fuel used during biofuel production has a large impact on the overall greenhouse gas emissions savings achieved by biofuels...

Due to government subsidies, and rising demand for biofuels, farmers worldwide have an increased economic incentive to grow crops for biofuel production instead of food production. Without political intervention, this could lead to reduced food production and increased food prices and inflation. The impacts of this would be greatest on poorer countries, a concern was expressed by Oxfam in 2007...

Human Rights Abuses

In some locations such as Indonesia deforestation for Palm Oil plantations is leading to displacement of Indigenous peoples. Also, extensive use of pesticide for biofuel crops is reducing clean water supplies

biofuel production can threaten the environment if it is not done sustainably...

Biofuels and solar energy efficiency

Biofuels from plant materials convert energy that was originally captured from solar energy via photosynthesis. A comparison of conversion efficiency from solar to usable energy (taking into account the whole energy budgets) shows that photovoltaics are 100 times more efficient than corn ethanol [89] and 10 times more efficient than the best biofuel...

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/07/h...

Studies conclude that biofuels are not so green

Almost all biofuels used today cause more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional fuels if the pollution caused by producing these "green" fuels is taken into account, two studies published Thursday have concluded...

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pb...

Water use: Biofuel plants' thirst creates water worries

Answer 2

Any plant that produces fat can be used to produce biofuel.  The most common plants used are the oil seed plants such as corn, rape, sunflour soybean, palm etc.

Answer 3

Sugar cane is used in the philippines and other asian countries...

Did you know that the water you used to clean rice can be made into fuel?

Well that's quite true. In some countries they've been experimenting some sources of bio fuel!

Answer 4

You can use basically any plant, because, while in air-tight, not air proof, space, they will ferment and derive ethanol. higher the sugar, fructose-content, the higher amount of ethanol distilled. Brazil does use sugar-cane for years and even Ford does supplies import there, by exchangeable-fuel switch engines.

Answer 5

In Brazil they use sugar cane and have been for decades.

US usually uses corn.

Corn is a bad choice because it is an energy intensive plant.

Believe it or not, sweet grass is one of the best choices.  It doesn't require the intense energy needs of corn nor the pesticides or fertilizers.  It can be grown on marginal land.  Test show it is 500 times more efficient, overall, than corn at producing bio-fuels.

Bio-fuels are not the answer.  For bio-fuels to provide the same energy as we now get from oil the US would need to have hundreds of times the land we have under the till now for all aspects of crop growing.

Answer 6

The soybean plant is one.  Other than that, I don't know.