Page 27 - Advances in Eco-Fuels for a Sustainable Environment

4 Advances in Eco-Fuels for a Sustainable Environment

energy resources, including one-third of the world’s total uranium resources, one-tenth
of black coal resources, and about 2% of total natural gas resources [11]. Australia
makes a significant contribution as the ninth-largest energy producer in the world
[12]. The Australian Energy Statistic (AES) revealed that Australia’s energy consump-
tion was sourced from about 32.2% coal, 37.8% oil, 24.2% gas, and 5.8% renewable
energy in 2015 [13]. The highest share of liquid oil is primarily consumed by the road
transport, mining, and manufacturing sectors in Australia. Among those, the transport
sector consumed about 27.20% of total energy consumption in 2015 [13]. Ball and
Ahmad [14] reported that the consumption of energy by this sector has increased by
about 1.70% per year in recent decades. Australia’s Department of Environment
(DoE) revealed that the transport sector GHG emissions increased about 24% between
1999–2000 and 2013–14 [15]. So, this sector is energy and emission intensive in
Australia as well as all over the world. The use of ecofuels can reduce the emissions
and that is why the Australian government took the initiative and set mandatory targets
ofabout5%–10%ecofuelindifferentstatesinrecentyears.In2015,Australiaproduced
about 130 million liters of ecofuel (including bioethanol and biodiesel) and imported
159 million liters to make up its 289 million liters of total ecofuel consumption.
Advanced ecofuels have also created a new market in the aviation sector in recent
years. A study performed by the Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research
Organization (CSIRO) in 2011, supported by major aviation companies, identified
that a 20% GHG emission reduction is possible by using aviation biofuels [16].As
a result, Qantas first experimentally operated a flight from Sydney to Adelaide with
a 50% biofuel blend with commercial jet fuel, which was a successful application of
biofuel in this sector. Now, Australia and New Zealand are expecting to use about 5%
by 2020 to 40% by 2050 of bio-derived aviation fuel from various feedstocks [16].
Hence, aviation biofuel and biodiesel produced from different feedstocks have good
prospects in the energy market in Australia as well as throughout the world. This book
focuses on the investigation of these ecofuels and related issues.
The key information of the background to this study is presented in Fig. 1.4. As can
be seen, fossil fuel consumption is increasing daily all over the world, which is

Fig. 1.4 Key points of the background study.