The critical role of advanced sustainability assessment tools in enhancing the real-world application of biofuels

Abstract

Sustainability has become of paramount importance in the biofuel industry. Accordingly, various sustainability assessment schemes such as emergy analysis, techno-economic analysis, life cycle assessment, energy accounting, and exergy analysis and its extensions (exergoeconomic, exergoenvironmental, and exergoeconoenvironmental analyses) are being employed increasingly for decision-making on biofuel production and consumption systems. In this opinion paper, after classifying and describing biofuel generations, the developed sustainability assessment tools are critically explained, and their pros and cons are discussed. Overall, among the various sustainability assessment approaches introduced so far, exergy-based methods appear to be the most promising tools for developing sustainable biofuel systems. This can be attributed to the fact that the exergy concept is deeply rooted in the well-defined principles of thermodynamics.