BIOETHANOL FROM STRAW AND ITS PUBLIC ACCEPTANCE

Abstract

The consequences of global warming and the need for a reduction in greenhouse gases have led to dramatic changes in the automotive sector. Whereas the use of biofuel increased continuously over the first decade of this century, e-mobility has been deemed.by politicians and the media alike. As the development of the electric car, rechargeable batteries and charging stations are far from being fully explored, biofuels will play an important role as a bridging technology over the next 20 years. The successful use of biofuels requires its widespread acceptance by consumers. To evaluate the public opinion towards biofuels we carried out a representative opinion poll to collect information on the population’s acceptance of biofuels. The result indicates that there is a lack of interest and information about biofuels, especially among young people and women. First generation bioethanol is strongly associated with the waste of food, but the acceptance of the second generation, produced from agricultural remnants like straw from wheat or corn, is considerably higher. The interviewees see more transparent, objective and less technical information about biofuels as an essential way to increase the level of information and the acceptance rate. In summary, the introduction of biofuels must be accompanied by information campaigns if biofuels should ever reach larger market shares. The irritations caused by the manipulation of the software on the part of several automobile manufacturers of Diesel engines could pave the way for this. So, future decentralized bioethanol plants could play an important role in biofuel production and contribute to the development of rural areas. In this paper the legal aspects of biofuel usage are described, the State of the art Bioethanol production from lignocellulosic material is described, the production capacity worldwide is calculated and the results from an opinion poll concerning the public acceptance of biofuels are presented.

 Keywords: Advanced Biofuels, Bioethanol, lignocellulose; opinion poll, public acceptance

 Article DOI: http://doi.org/10.15544/RD.2017.009