 Embodied energy and emergy evaluation of a typical biodiesel production chain in ChinaL.P. Ju and B. Chen Ecological Modelling, 2011, vol. 222, issue 14, 2385-2392 Abstract: Biodiesel from non-grain feedstock has been considered as one of the proper substitutes for fossil fuels associated with a series of activities emerging in China in order to meet the resource shortage and develop the energy crops. This paper presents an ecological accounting framework based on embodied energy, emergy, and CO2 emission for the whole production chain of biodiesel made from Jatropha curcas L. (JCL) oil. The energy and materials invested in and CO2 emission from the whole process, including cropping, transportation, extraction, and production, are accounted and calculated. Also, EmCO2, the ratio of real CO2 released to the emergy-based sustainability indicator per joule biodiesel, is proposed in this paper to present a new goal function for low-carbon system optimization. Finally, the results are compared with those of the bioethanol (wheat) production in Henan Province, China, and bioethanol (corn) production in Italy in view of the indices of embodied energy, emergy and CO2 emissions and EmCO2. Keywords: Energy crop; Emergy; Embodied energy; CO2 emission; Low-carbon economy; Emergy ontology (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecomod:v:222:y:2011:i:14:p:2385-2392 DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2010.07.021 Access Statistics for this article Ecological Modelling is currently edited by Brian D. Fath More articles in Ecological Modelling from Elsevier |
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