IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/rensus/v134y2020ics1364032120304354.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Life-cycle energy use and greenhouse gas emissions of palm fatty acid distillate derived renewable diesel

Author

Listed:
  • Xu, H.
  • Lee, U.
  • Wang, M.

Abstract

This study aims to quantify life-cycle fossil energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for palm fatty acid distillate (PFAD) derived renewable diesel (RD) taking into consideration different feedstock classifications that are applicable to PFAD (residue, byproduct, or coproduct), and incorporating updated data for key processes. Under the three classifications, the PFAD to RD pathway was modeled using the Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy Use in Technologies (GREET®) model. PFAD-derived RD could reduce fossil energy consumption by 77%–88%, relative to petroleum diesel. GHG emissions are very sensitive to PFAD classification and coproduct handling methods. Considering the production of palm oil and PFAD and economic value, we maintain that PFAD should be treated as a byproduct in palm oil refineries. With this treatment, PFAD-derived RD could achieve 84% GHG emissions reductions, compared to the emissions of petroleum diesel. We also employed a substitution method to address the substitution of PFAD by other materials in the marketplace. Compared to coproduct allocation results, we found substituting PFAD by tallow, soy oil, barley, and canola oil results in lower GHG emissions. Due to high induced land-use change emissions associated with palm farming, if PFAD is treated as a coproduct with refined palm oil, PFAD-derived RD may not deliver GHG reductions. A sensitivity analysis identified key parameters such as palm fruit yield, oil extraction efficiency in oil mills, and energy use intensity for RD production affects LCA results significantly; future efforts to improve these parameters could result in further GHG reductions.

Suggested Citation

  • Xu, H. & Lee, U. & Wang, M., 2020. "Life-cycle energy use and greenhouse gas emissions of palm fatty acid distillate derived renewable diesel," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:rensus:v:134:y:2020:i:c:s1364032120304354
    DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2020.110144
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032120304354
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.rser.2020.110144?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wang, Michael & Huo, Hong & Arora, Salil, 2011. "Methods of dealing with co-products of biofuels in life-cycle analysis and consequent results within the U.S. context," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 5726-5736, October.
    2. Silalertruksa, Thapat & Gheewala, Shabbir H., 2012. "Environmental sustainability assessment of palm biodiesel production in Thailand," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 306-314.
    3. Cho, Hyun Jun & Kim, Jin-Kuk & Ahmed, Faisal & Yeo, Yeong-Koo, 2013. "Life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions and energy balances of a biodiesel production from palm fatty acid distillate (PFAD)," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 479-488.
    4. Loh, S.K. & Nasrin, A.B. & Mohamad Azri, S. & Nurul Adela, B. & Muzzammil, N. & Daryl Jay, T. & Stasha Eleanor, R.A. & Lim, W.S. & Choo, Y.M. & Kaltschmitt, M., 2017. "First Report on Malaysia’s experiences and development in biogas capture and utilization from palm oil mill effluent under the Economic Transformation Programme: Current and future perspectives," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 1257-1274.
    5. Archer, Sophie A. & Murphy, Richard J. & Steinberger-Wilckens, Robert, 2018. "Methodological analysis of palm oil biodiesel life cycle studies," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 694-704.
    6. Sophie Parsons & Sofia Raikova & Christopher J. Chuck, 2020. "The viability and desirability of replacing palm oil," Nature Sustainability, Nature, vol. 3(6), pages 412-418, June.
    7. Hassan, Mohd Nor Azman & Jaramillo, Paulina & Griffin, W. Michael, 2011. "Life cycle GHG emissions from Malaysian oil palm bioenergy development: The impact on transportation sector's energy security," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 2615-2625, May.
    8. Gernot Pehnelt & Christoph Vietze, 2013. "Recalculating GHG emissions saving of palm oil biodiesel," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 429-479, April.
    9. Havlík, Petr & Schneider, Uwe A. & Schmid, Erwin & Böttcher, Hannes & Fritz, Steffen & Skalský, Rastislav & Aoki, Kentaro & Cara, Stéphane De & Kindermann, Georg & Kraxner, Florian & Leduc, Sylvain & , 2011. "Global land-use implications of first and second generation biofuel targets," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 5690-5702, October.
    10. Jung-Yull Shin & Gun-Woo Kim & Janet S. Zepernick & Kyu-Young Kang, 2018. "A Comparative Study on the RFS Program of Korea with the US and UK," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-20, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Stefania Lucantonio & Andrea Di Giuliano & Leucio Rossi & Katia Gallucci, 2023. "Green Diesel Production via Deoxygenation Process: A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-44, January.
    2. Wu, Wei & Supankanok, Rasa & Chandra-Ambhorn, Walairat & Taipabu, Muhammad Ikhsan, 2023. "Novel CO2-negative design of palm oil-based polygeneration systems," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 203(C), pages 622-633.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Abdul-Manan, Amir F.N., 2017. "Lifecycle GHG emissions of palm biodiesel: Unintended market effects negate direct benefits of the Malaysian Economic Transformation Plan (ETP)," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 56-65.
    2. Yoyon Wahyono & Hadiyanto Hadiyanto & Mochamad Arief Budihardjo & Joni Safaat Adiansyah, 2020. "Assessing the Environmental Performance of Palm Oil Biodiesel Production in Indonesia: A Life Cycle Assessment Approach," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-25, June.
    3. Canabarro, N.I. & Silva-Ortiz, P. & Nogueira, L.A.H. & Cantarella, H. & Maciel-Filho, R. & Souza, G.M., 2023. "Sustainability assessment of ethanol and biodiesel production in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Guatemala," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).
    4. Gal Hochman & Chrysostomos Tabakis, 2020. "Biofuels and Their Potential in South Korea," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(17), pages 1-17, September.
    5. Stephen G. Wiedemann & Quan V. Nguyen & Simon J. Clarke, 2022. "Using LCA and Circularity Indicators to Measure the Sustainability of Textiles—Examples of Renewable and Non-Renewable Fibres," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(24), pages 1-14, December.
    6. O. Borodina, S. Kyryziuk, V. Yarovyi, Yu. Ermoliev, T. Ermolieva, 2016. "Modeling local land uses under the global climate change," Economy and Forecasting, Valeriy Heyets, issue 1, pages 117-128.
    7. Batidzirai, B. & Smeets, E.M.W. & Faaij, A.P.C., 2012. "Harmonising bioenergy resource potentials—Methodological lessons from review of state of the art bioenergy potential assessments," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(9), pages 6598-6630.
    8. Kargbo, Hannah & Harris, Jonathan Stuart & Phan, Anh N., 2021. "“Drop-in” fuel production from biomass: Critical review on techno-economic feasibility and sustainability," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    9. Alice Favero & Robert Mendelsohn, 2013. "Evaluating the Global Role of Woody Biomass as a Mitigation Strategy," Working Papers 2013.37, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    10. Cao, Yan & Doustgani, Amir & Salehi, Abozar & Nemati, Mohammad & Ghasemi, Amir & Koohshekan, Omid, 2020. "The economic evaluation of establishing a plant for producing biodiesel from edible oil wastes in oil-rich countries: Case study Iran," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    11. Camacho, Carmen & Pérez-Barahona, Agustín, 2015. "Land use dynamics and the environment," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 96-118.
    12. Carl-Friedrich Schleussner & Joeri Rogelj & Michiel Schaeffer & Tabea Lissner & Rachel Licker & Erich M. Fischer & Reto Knutti & Anders Levermann & Katja Frieler & William Hare, 2016. "Science and policy characteristics of the Paris Agreement temperature goal," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 6(9), pages 827-835, September.
    13. Cai, Hao & Burnham, Andrew & Chen, Rui & Wang, Michael, 2017. "Wells to wheels: Environmental implications of natural gas as a transportation fuel," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 565-578.
    14. Gamborg, Christian & Anker, Helle Tegner & Sandøe, Peter, 2014. "Ethical and legal challenges in bioenergy governance: Coping with value disagreement and regulatory complexity," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 326-333.
    15. Mosnier, A. & Havlík, P. & Valin, H. & Baker, J. & Murray, B. & Feng, S. & Obersteiner, M. & McCarl, B.A. & Rose, S.K. & Schneider, U.A., 2013. "Alternative U.S. biofuel mandates and global GHG emissions: The role of land use change, crop management and yield growth," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 602-614.
    16. Uusitalo, V. & Väisänen, S. & Havukainen, J. & Havukainen, M. & Soukka, R. & Luoranen, M., 2014. "Carbon footprint of renewable diesel from palm oil, jatropha oil and rapeseed oil," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 103-113.
    17. Wetser, Koen & Sudirjo, Emilius & Buisman, Cees J.N. & Strik, David P.B.T.B., 2015. "Electricity generation by a plant microbial fuel cell with an integrated oxygen reducing biocathode," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 151-157.
    18. Hoekman, S. Kent & Broch, Amber, 2018. "Environmental implications of higher ethanol production and use in the U.S.: A literature review. Part II – Biodiversity, land use change, GHG emissions, and sustainability," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 81(P2), pages 3159-3177.
    19. Carraro, Carlo & Favero, Alice & Massetti, Emanuele, 2012. "“Investments and public finance in a green, low carbon, economy”," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(S1), pages 15-28.
    20. Withers, Mitch R. & Malina, Robert & Barrett, Steven R.H., 2015. "Carbon, climate, and economic breakeven times for biofuel from woody biomass from managed forests," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 45-52.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:rensus:v:134:y:2020:i:c:s1364032120304354. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.