CSIRO Report: Environmental Impacts of Biofuel Production in Western Australia

The Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) recently released a report on the results of a life cycle assessment (LCA) of environmental outcomes and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Western Australia. LCA is a technique that help evaluate/assess environmental and other related impacts on a product, process or service. This can be achieved by (1) conducting an inventory of raw material inputs, product outputs, discharge of environmental pollutants, and energy flows, (2) evaluating the material and energy flows to analyze potential environmental impacts, and (3) interpreting the results to aid in decision-making. Some highlights of the study are: (1) biofuels based on E10 (10% ethanol blend) and B5 (5% biodiesel blend) can achieve "greenhouse gas savings" equivalent to 6% reduction in GHG emissions for the transport sector in Western Australia, (2) electricity production from the ethanol plant (through the utilization of biogas from anaerobic treatment of factory waste streams) contributed significantly to GHG reduction, (3) biofuel ethanol has a net positive energy yield equivalent to 9.7 units of useable energy produced for every unit of fossil energy used in the ethanol production process. The complete LCA report can be accessed at the website Department of Agriculture and Food, Western Australia (URL above).

Related information on Life Cycle Analysis
http://www.umich.edu/~nppcpub/resources/compendia/CORPpdfs/CORPlca.pdf
http://www.epa.gov/nrmrl/lcaccess/
http://www.pre.nl/life_cycle_assessment/