Production Of Biofuels By Virtue Of Yeast Fermentation Essay

This report extensively analyses the production and breakdown of Ethanols, to assess its properties and their relation to being a fuel. The use of Ethanol as reliable source of renewable energy and its current effects on society. The potential use of ethanol as an alternative to coal and fossil fuels, the advantages and disadvantages of Ethanol.

Bioprospecting is the investigation for diverse organisms that are capable of producing enzymes, biochemicals, or other compounds that can be intuitively useful in which commercial valuable compounds for humans can be obtained. For instance, bioprospecting can aid the research to find sustainable biofuels. A biofuel is a fuel produced from organic material, including biomass, plants, or ethanol. Ethanol consists of fermenting plant fibers such as cellulose. Therefore, discovering new microbial communities that are capable of degrading cellulose establishes a potential of creating biofuels such as ethanol. Additionally, the abundant availability of cellulose makes this compound an attractive, raw material alternative for fuel. For instance, this would allow the decrease in the dependence on fossil fuels, such as oil, while benefitting the environment by reducing harmful emissions into the atmosphere. If a microbe were discovered that could rapidly break down cellulose, biofuel production could increase, having a positive impact on the environment. Cellulose is composed of a polysaccharide consisting of glucose

Bio-fuels are also known as agro fuels. They are a renewable source of energy made from animal and vegetable material and a large portion of municipal solid and industrial waste. Bio-fuels are major sources of fuel from biomass. Biomass is any organic material stored in the tissues of living plants and animals. Plants generate their energy from the solar power using the chlorophyll in the leaves to create tissue from water in the ground and carbon dioxide in the air and animals take their energy from plants either by directly eating plants or by eating other animals that have eaten plants. Even though biofuels are sources of energy obtained from renewable resources, the positive effects to the environment are far outweighed by the negative effects to the environment from the production of these biofuels. Our need for energy is increasing day by day for heating, cooling, cooking, driving, etc. One of the major reasons for the development of bio-fuels is the act that fossil fuel oil reserves are limited. Based on total worldwide oil reserves of 143.1 thousand million tons of oil (end 2001) and a worldwide oil consumption rate of 3510.6 million tons, it is estimated that the oil reserves will probably last until 2044. Also, there has been increasing concerns regarding global emissions of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and nitrous oxides. Biodiesel, which is the most popular form of bio-fuel, is used in any diesel

The biggest problem the United States faces today when we talk about becoming energy independent is replacing the gas we use to power our vehicles. When we talk about replacing gasoline as the fuel we use to power our vehicles, biomass, hydrogen, and fuel cells are the three most talked about alternatives. Biomass, which is organic material made from plants and animals, contains stored energy from the sun. Biomass in the form of bio fuels can be used to make the same products as those we make from fossil fuels. Its main advantages over fossil fuels are that bio fuels are better for the environment and can be produced right here in the United States. Although some experts complain that bio fuels release carbon

Henry Ford, in 1925, dubbed biofuels “the fuel of the future”. Today, Mr. Ford’s prediction is coming true because biofuels are proving to be one of the most promising sources of alternative energy. Biofuels are popular because they only release the CO2 that was collected during photosynthesis. They solve many of the problems that fossil fuels present: greenhouse gases, emissions, resource depletion, and foreign oil dependency. On the other hand, biofuel production has drawbacks such as resource requirements, air and groundwater pollution, and usage of space. The best material to invest in as a biofuel company is switchgrass lignocellulose, using the process of catalytic pyrolysis to better combat the fuel crisis.

i. Ethanol is considered as a alternative fuel at a lower cost level in relation to gasoline. It is produced by fermenting sugars from a range of feedstock such as wheat and corn. Ethanol is blended with gasoline from E10 (5% ethanol - 95% gasoline) to E85 (85% ethanol - 15% gasoline).

Biofuel is a type of energy which can be derived from biomass, animal waste and most controversially from renewable plants. Biofuel is used as a substitute for oil and other energies. The reasons for the growing fame of biofuel is both negative and positive as it is an alternative form of energy for the government and makes their life easy, on the other hand biofuel has made people life miserable by causing a raise in food prices. Biofuel is currently present in many different forms including Biodiesel, Bioethanol and Biogas.

Energy can be produced from electrical, mechanical, and some forms of living organisms, among others. Different types of energy production may have specific advantages and disadvantages, weather those concerns are environmental, economical, or political. While the function of biofuels has potential for abating some concerns, other concerns arise from the use of biofuels. Industrialized nations seem to be leading the production as well as the consumption of all energy resources, including biofuels.

What are biofuels? A biofuel is a liquid, solid or any gaseous fuel derived from organic matter such as waste plant and animal matter. (Biofuels Assosiation Australia , 2014) Did you know wood was the first form of biofuel ever used? Biofuels are commonly referred to as first generation biofuels, because they are produced from a large variety of organic materials such as starch, sugary plants, corn, wheat, sugar cane, soybeans, and vegetable oils, using conventional technology. The main biofuels include bioethanol and biodiesel. Bioethanol is used as a replacement for petrol, whilst biodiesel is used as a replacement for diesel (greenfacts, 2014). Biofuels maintain an immense growth area around the world and have a vital mrole to play in displacing fossil fuels. Due to environmental concerns and volatility of oil supply, the development of alternative fuels is crucial to the future of the transport sector. A potential biofuel that can be of great assistence in the future is 2, 5- Dimethylfuran (C6H8O) which can be used as an alternative to gasoline (fossil fuel).

Energy shortage problem has emerged as a result of development. Traditional energy sources, petroleum and coal, are estimated to deplete within this century, therefore, as an important substitute, biofuel is intensively studied now. Current technologies to produce biofuel from animal fats and plants are well-developed, however, these production methods rely on a significant land area for plant growth, which will affect the food supplement, leading to food price and safety issues. Many algae have high oil-producing potential and they require minimum land to grow compared with plants. They also showed good productivity and environmental-friendly character, thus, research on algae biofuel production is a hot focus. Arthrospira, Chlorella, Dunaliella, Haematococcus and some other algae species have been showed good potential in biofuel production.

Biomass can be considered as a renewable energy resource, although burning biomass releases carbon dioxide (CO2) to the atmosphere similar to burning fossil fuel (Liu H. 2011). There is a significant difference in CO2 release between burning a fossil fuel and burning biomass. Burning a fossil fuel releases CO2 that has been locked up for millions of years in the ground, affecting the natural CO2 cycle and resulting in an increase in the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Burning biomass simply return to the atmosphere the same amount of CO2 which was absorbed from the air via the photosynthesis process while the biomass plant was growing over a relatively short period of time (a few years to decade), and there is no net release of C02 into the atmosphere, i.e., CO2-neutral, if the cycle of growth and harvest is sustained. Therefore, biomass can consider as a renewable energy resource as shown in Figure 3.1 (Li u H. 2011). If the production and transportation of the biomass fuel involve the use of fossil fuel, there would become net release of CO2 with biomass combustion (Liu H. 2011)

In the world of global warming, all kinds of pollution and fuel shortages going on, renewable and clean/ green energy is increasingly the ideal solution of energy related problems we have to solve one way or another. Biofuel is one of the mainstream and highly supported solutions nowadays, an idea to make renewable fuel by living organisms such as fiber, corn, vegetable oil or sugar cane. Unlike nonrenewable fossil fuels over extracted by people causing various environmental problems like generating a considerable amount greenhouse gas, current technology already lets renewable fuel like biofuels to shrink a certain amount of greenhouse gas production, making it a more ‘clean’ source of energy.

Unlike gasoline or diesel, biofuels release little pollution. It can also be used to produce electricity by heating water using biofuels and using the steam produced to rotate a turbine. Another method is to allow the biofuel to decay and produce methane. Methane is commonly used as fuel for car, heating, cooking, and producing electricity.

The first advantage of biofuels is that it can reduce the carbon emissions by 50 to 60%. This is a great advantage due to the fact that the world is currently facing major climate change issues, which is becoming a problem, as carbon dioxide is part of the gases on earth. Every day we release an amount of carbon dioxide. As we burn certain substances to create Energy they release are harmful amounts of gases. The earth then starts to warm up as when the sunlight reaches the earths surface it's either reflected back into space or it can be absorbed by the earth, as it is absorbed it releases some energy back into the atmosphere as heat. This is then how are the earth is slowly heating up and makes it clear as to why biofuels are a better source

Thus, the foremost step in the biochemical conversion is the pretreatment of the biomass, which involves the deconstruction of the cell wall into its components, i.e., the lignin, hemicellulose and cellulose (Sun and Cheng, 2002; Kumar et al., 2009). The biomass can be pretreated using different physical, chemical, biological or combination of these methods (Kumar et al., 2009). Each method has its own advantages and limitations. The suitability of the pretreatment method depends on the type of the biomass feedstock (Khare et al., 2015). The efficiency of the pretreatment step, however, is the key factor determining the yield of the hydrolysis in the cellulosic ethanol production process (Alvira et al., 2010) as it ensures the accessibility of the carbohydrate polymers for their subsequent hydrolysis in the fermentable sugars. In the next step, i.e., the saccharification, the celluloses and hemicelluloses are hydrolysed into C6 and C5 sugars with the help of cellulases and hemicellulases enzymes respectively (Sarkar et al., 2012). The last step involves the conventional approach of fermentation of C6 and C5 sugars into ethanol using either native or genetically modified ethanologenic microbes (Gnansounnou and Dauriat, 2005).