Fuel for Thought

Handbook of Plant-Based
Biofuels
Edited by Ashok Pandey
CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL, 2008. 297 pp.,
hardcover US$ 119.95ISBN 978-1-56022175-3

During this time

of significant volatility and uncertainty
in
the
liquid fuel market,
the utilization of
alternatives such
as biomass in the
production
of
liquid fuels has
gained resurgence
in the areas of research, investment, and development.
Conversion of biomass to biofuels is the
only process that utilizes renewable, reduced carbon for the production of a
liquid energy carrier. As such, it is the
only long-term, sustainable method of
utilizing conventional transportation
technologies such as internal combustion or jet engines.
It is therefore timely that Editor Ashok
Pandey has assembled a comprehensive
reference on the production of plantbased renewable biofuels, focusing specifically on the chemistry and process
technology for the production of bioethanol and biodiesel. As noted in the
preface, these two biofuels appear to be
promising future energy carriers and a
replacement for limited fossil fuels and
raw materials. To adequately review
these two biofuels, 45 authors contributed 20 chapters within three sections focusing on a general introduction to biofuels, production of bioethanol, and production of biodiesel. Contained within
these chapters are details on the economics, process chemistry, engineering,
process design, and environmental

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issues of bioethanol and biodiesel production.

The organizational structure of this
handbook makes it a useful text for both
students and advanced researchers. Introductory chapters for each section are
clearly written and sufficiently broad in
content to benefit undergraduate students who are new to studying chemical
processes. At the same time, subsequent
chapters serve as well-detailed reviews
of specific aspects of process technology.
This range of informational complexity
allows this text to serve as either a
course textbook or a quick reference for
technical details.
The first section provides an effective
introduction to biofuel technology with
an initial chapter describing the role of
biofuels in the development of renewable energy. Topics covered include an
overview of the world energy scenario,
an introduction to competing renewable
energy technologies, and a brief exposition on the integration of biofuels within
the existing fuel infrastructure. Subsequent chapters within this section provide a brief evaluation of existing technology for thermochemical processing of
biomass including gasification, pyrolysis,
liquefaction, and synthetic fuel production. The last chapter of section one reviews the biodiesel economy with a description of the transesterification
chemistry and biodiesel fuel properties.
The second section includes seven
chapters with in-depth detail regarding
all aspects of the production of bioethanol. The introductory chapter by Edgard
Gnansounou discusses the current status
of ethanol production as well as the outlook for future ethanol development dependent on energy security, economic
and environmental drivers, and technological development. Six subsequent
chapters provide extensively detailed descriptions of specific industrial processes
or process technologies for bioethanol
production including 1) ethanol from

molasses, 2) production of starch saccharifying enzymes, 3) hydrolysis and fermentation of starchy biomass, 4) pretreatment of lignocellulosic biomass,
5) production of enzymes for lignocellulosic biomass, and 6) hydrolysis and fermentation of lignocellulosic biomass.
The last section covering biodiesel is
introduced with current and future perspectives of the biodiesel industry fuel
markets and a brief description of fuel
standards, feedstocks, and opportunities.
A second introductory chapter provides
an effective review of the chemical characteristics of vegetable oil, various chemical catalysts, and the overall process
chemistries of esterification. The next
two chapters clearly describe current alternative biodiesel technologies including aspects of lipase-catalyzed preparation of biodiesel and biodiesel production with supercritical fluid technologies.
Altogether, these four chapters effectively review the broad aspects of biodiesel
technologies.
These chapters are combined with an
additional five chapters in this third section which describe specific biodiesel
production processes around the world.
This approach successfully connects the
description of general biodiesel chemistry with the fuel characteristics and production details of biodiesel processes
from particular vegetable oil feedstocks.
Full reviews describe biodiesel production from: 1) palm oil in Malaysia, 2) rice
bran oil, 3) Karanja (Pongamia pinnata)
and Jatropha (Jatropha curcas), 4) Mahua
(Madhuca indica) seed oil, and 5) rubber
(Hevea brasiliensis) seed oil. Each chapter
contains significant detail of the various
processes including process diagrams
and descriptions, chemical reaction data
and fuel characteristics as well-organized
figures.
The organizational approach taken by
Dr. Pandey to enlist numerous experts
on bioethanol and biodiesel succeeds in
creating an effective handbook for pro-

 2010 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

ChemSusChem 2010, 3, 386 387

cess technology. Readers with limited

knowledge of renewable fuels will be capable of picking up this book and understanding the broad themes, while an advanced researcher will find it a useful
technical reference on her/his bookshelf.
Additionally, the content is well balanced
between introductory information, biological technology, and aspects of pro-

ChemSusChem 2010, 3, 386 387

duction. However, limited coverage of

thermochemical technologies and biofuel production processes such as pyrolysis provides opportunity for improvement in future editions.
Overall, this book contains valuable information in a well-written style, and I
thoroughly enjoyed reading and reviewing the various summary tables and fig-

 2010 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

ures. This handbook is therefore recommended to persons interested in learning more about biomass-to-biofuels
processing.
Paul J. Dauenhauer
Amherst, MA (USA)
DOI: 10.1002/cssc.201000009

www.chemsuschem.org

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