Energy balance and GHG emission of various biodiesels: Global prospects

The biodiesel production has increased in Europe during the period 2008-09 by about 16% and Italy is the 4th European producer country. The EU Fuel Quality Directive imposes to reach a minimum threshold of 10% diesel blending with biodiesel by 2020 and of 25% by 2030; the target is to reduce greenhouse gases emitted by vehicles, considering that biodiesel is a renewable fuel and it can be considered as a fuel of the future. Nevertheless, there is still little consensus on the sustainability of various biodiesel production practices. In this context, it is very important to identify and assess the environmental impacts associated with the whole biodiesel production chain in order to estimate the role that biodiesel production may have in terms of global impact. Among the different environmental assessment tools, potentially usable for this purpose, in this paper Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology is evaluated through the presentation of a review of existing LCA studies on biodiesel.