title: Emergy analysis and sustainability efficiency analysis of different crop-based biodiesel in life cycle perspective.
abstract: Biodiesel as a promising alternative energy resource has been a hot spot in chemical engineering nowadays, but there is also an argument about the sustainability of biodiesel. In order to analyze the sustainability of biodiesel production systems and select the most sustainable scenario, various kinds of crop-based biodiesel including soybean-, rapeseed-, sunflower-, jatropha- and palm-based biodiesel production options are studied by emergy analysis; soybean-based scenario is recognized as the most sustainable scenario that should be chosen for further study in China. DEA method is used to evaluate the sustainability efficiencies of these options, and the biodiesel production systems based on soybean, sunflower, and palm are considered as DEA efficient, whereas rapeseed-based and jatropha-based scenarios are needed to be improved, and the improved methods have also been specified.
authors.affiliation: Department of Industrial Engineering, Quality and Environmental Research Centre (CESQA), University of Padova, Via Marzolo 9, 35131 Padova, Italy.
authors.forename: Jingzheng
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ren
authors.forename: Alessandro
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Manzardo
authors.forename: Anna
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mazzi
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fedele
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Scipioni
mesh_terms: D056804:Biofuels / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D018556:Crops, Agricultural / Q000502:physiology*; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D059205:Renewable Energy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*
chemical_list: D056804:Biofuels