Cabrera-Jiménez Richard, Tulus Victor, Gavaldà Jordi, Jiménez Laureano, Guillén-Gosálbez Gonzalo, Pozo Carlos
Departament d'Enginyeria Química, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Av. Països Catalans 26, 43007 Tarragona, Spain.
Institute for Chemical and Bioengineering, Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zürich, Vladimir-Prelog-Weg 1, 8093 Zürich, Switzerland.
ACS Sustain Chem Eng. 2023 Jun 13;11(25):9359-9371. doi: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.3c00750. eCollection 2023 Jun 26.
In this contribution, we study the extent to which 68 scenarios for microalgae biofuels could help the heavy-duty transport sector operate within planetary boundaries. The proposed scenarios are built considering a range of alternative configurations based on three types of fuel production processes (i.e., transesterification, hydrodeoxygenation, and hydrothermal liquefaction), different carbon sources (such as natural gas power plants and direct air capture), byproduct treatments, and two electricity mixes. Our results reveal that microalgae biofuels could significantly reduce the environmental and human health impacts of the business-as-usual (fossil-based) heavy-duty transport sector. Moreover, relative to standard biofuels that show large land-use requirements, we find that microalgae biofuels also decrease the damage on biosphere integrity substantially. Notably, pathways resorting to hydrodeoxygenation of microalgae oil and direct air capture and carbon storage could reduce the current impact induced globally on climate change by the heavy transport by 77%, while attaining six-fold reductions in biosphere integrity impacts, both relative to conventional biofuels.
在本论文中，我们研究了68种微藻生物燃料方案在多大程度上有助于重型运输部门在地球边界内运行。所提出的方案是基于三种燃料生产工艺（即酯交换、加氢脱氧和水热液化）、不同的碳源（如天然气发电厂和直接空气捕获）、副产品处理以及两种电力组合，考虑一系列替代配置构建的。我们的结果表明，微藻生物燃料可以显著降低常规（化石基）重型运输部门对环境和人类健康的影响。此外，相对于显示出大量土地使用需求的标准生物燃料，我们发现微藻生物燃料也大幅减少了对生物圈完整性的损害。值得注意的是，采用微藻油加氢脱氧以及直接空气捕获和碳储存的途径，相对于传统生物燃料，可将目前全球重型运输对气候变化的影响降低77%，同时使对生物圈完整性的影响降低六倍。
