Despite uncertainties, cellulosic biofuels still a win for ground transportation

Read the full story from the University of Illinois College of ACES.

Despite the fervor around electric vehicles and their potential to reduce the transportation sector’s carbon footprint, 2023 projections suggest EVs won’t edge out gas-powered vehicles for decades to come. With conventional vehicles likely to dominate the ground fleet for the foreseeable future, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign experts say cellulosic biofuels shouldn’t be discounted. 

Researchers in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES) and the Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment (iSEE) at U. of I. note that support for cellulosics has waned in part due to uncertainty around land availability, feedstock yields, costs, and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission savings. In a recent study, they quantified these uncertainties for multiple feedstocks and policy scenarios, concluding that cellulosic feedstocks outperform corn ethanol in nearly all cases — but will require considerable policy support to grow and sustain the industry.