In this paper, we review some of the basic energy balance and climate change impact issues associated with biofuels. For both the basic energy and greenhouse gas balances of producing and using a range of fuels, and for the increasingly debated and important issues of nongreenhouse gas impacts...

The global petroleum system is undergoing a shift to substitutes for conventional petroleum (SCPs). The Regional Optimization Model for Emissions from Oil Substitutes, or ROMEO, models this oil transition and its greenhouse gas impacts. ROMEO models the global liquid fuel market in an economic...

In this paper, we review some of the basic energy balance and climate change impact issues associated with biofuels. For both the basic energy and greenhouse gas balances of producing and using a range of fuels, and for the increasingly debated and important issues of non-greenhouse gas impacts...

Implementation of many policies intended to reduce fuels’ contribution to global warming require an estimate of the global warming intensity (GWI) of various fuels. Determining the climate effect of a direct substitution of fuels is not the same as determining the official value of each...

Executive Order S-1-07, the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) (January 18, 2007), calls for a reduction of at least 10 percent in the carbon intensity of California’s transportation fuels by 2020. It instructed the Secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency to coordinate...

The Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) can play a major role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and stimulating improvements in transportation fuel technologies so that California can meet its climate policy goals. In Part 1 of this study we evaluated the technical feasibility of achieving a 10...

We estimate the physical supply potential of biofuels from domestic municipal solid waste, forestry residues, crops residues and energy crops grown on existing cropland using optimistic assumptions about near-term conversion technologies. It is technically feasible to produce a significant...

Biofuel policies affect global agricultural and oil commodity markets, whose response has consequences for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Estimates of the net GHG impact of biofuel policies are wide ranging and shrouded in uncertainty. We perform a Monte Carlo experiment using a stylized model...