Biofuels - Economic aspects

Assuming an oil price of US$60 per barrel, both biodiesel and bioethanol produced from wheat are not profitable in Europe. The producers' high margins are only due to the current mineral oil tax concessions. At present, biomass-to-liquid (BTL) fuel also cannot be produced competitively. At the assumed oil price, only bioethanol and biobutanol produced on a large scale from lignocellulose-containing raw materials have the potential to be produced competitively. Analyses of the technologies used in this field show that in Europe there are interesting new technological developments for the hydrolysis, fermentation and purification step.