Abstract
Investment in biofuels, as sustainable alternatives for fossil fuels, has gained momentum over the last decade due to the global environmental and health concerns regarding fossil fuel consumption. Hence, effective management of biofuel supply chain (BSC) components, including biomass feedstock production, biomass logistics, biofuel production in biorefineries, and biofuel distribution to consumers, is crucial in transitioning towards a low-carbon and circular economy (CE). The present study aims to render an inclusive knowledge map of the BSC-related scientific production. In this vein, a systematic review, supported by a keywords co-occurrence analysis and qualitative content analysis, was carried out on a total of 1,975 peer-reviewed journal articles in the target literature. The analysis revealed four major research hotspots in the BSC literature, namely (1) biomass-to-biofuel supply chain design and planning, (2) environmental impacts of biofuel production, (3) biomass to bioenergy, and (4) techno-economic analysis of biofuel production. Besides, the findings showed that the following subject areas of research in the BSC research community have recently attracted more attention: (i) global warming and climate change mitigation, (ii) development of the third-generation biofuels produced from algal biomass, which has recently gained momentum in the CE debate, and (iii) government incentives, pricing, and subsidizing policies. The provided insights shed light on the understanding of researchers, stakeholders, and policy-makers involved in the sustainable energy sector by outlining the main research backgrounds, developments, and tendencies within the BSC arena. Looking at the provided knowledge map, potential research directions in BSCs towards implementing the CE model, including (i) integrative policy convergence at macro, meso, and micro levels, and (ii) industrializing algae-based biofuel production towards the CE transition, were proposed.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 133968 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| Journal | Chemosphere |
| Volume | 296 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Jun 2022 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The authors would like to thank Universiti Malaysia Terengganu under International Partnership Research Grant ( UMT /CRIM/2-2/2/23 (23), Vot 55302) for supporting this joint project with Henan Agricultural University under a Research Collaboration Agreement ( RCA ). This work is also supported by the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia , under the Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE), Institute of Tropical Aquaculture and Fisheries (AKUATROP) program (Vot. No. 56051, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (10) and Vot. No. 56052, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (11)). The manuscript is also supported by the Program for Innovative Research Team (in Science and Technology) in the University of Henan Province (No. 21IRTSTHN020 ) and Central Plain Scholar Funding Project of Henan Province (No. 212101510005). The authors would also like to extend their sincere appreciation to the University of Tehran and the Biofuel Research Team (BRTeam) for their support throughout this project.
Funding Information:
Governmental support plans, such as financial incentives, pricing strategies, and subsidy programs in progressing towards using biofuels, have appeared as a recent and ongoing subject area of BSC research. Due to the increasing public awareness of global warming, many governments provide monetary incentives to replace biofuels with fossil fuels (Denizel et al., 2020). In this regard, the role of governments to promote and encourage using biofuels through developing various incentive programs is indispensable. Wu et al. (2021) highlighted the urgent need for more investigations to effectively guide the government incentive programs for biomass supply chain management and coordination and alliance of profit distribution issues. Haji Esmaeili et al. (2020), in another research, recommended providing financial incentives to motivate producers of the first-generation bioethanol to switch to the second-generation bioethanol production due to serious food versus fuel debates resulting from the first-generation biofuel production. Moreover, risk mitigation strategies and policies are required to tackle the evolving and fluctuating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the sustainability of biomass supply chains (Sajid, 2021) towards achieving sustainable development (Ameli et al., 2022; Ranjbari et al., 2021b). The research in this domain has been mainly focused on waste-to-energy incentive policy design (Zhao and You, 2019), and carbon-pricing strategies (D?az-Trujillo et al., 2019).The authors would like to thank Universiti Malaysia Terengganu under International Partnership Research Grant (UMT/CRIM/2-2/2/23 (23), Vot 55302) for supporting this joint project with Henan Agricultural University under a Research Collaboration Agreement (RCA). This work is also supported by the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia, under the Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE), Institute of Tropical Aquaculture and Fisheries (AKUATROP) program (Vot. No. 56051, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (10) and Vot. No. 56052, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (11)). The manuscript is also supported by the Program for Innovative Research Team (in Science and Technology) in the University of Henan Province (No. 21IRTSTHN020) and Central Plain Scholar Funding Project of Henan Province (No. 212101510005). The authors would also like to extend their sincere appreciation to the University of Tehran and the Biofuel Research Team (BRTeam) for their support throughout this project.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Elsevier Ltd
Funding
The authors would like to thank Universiti Malaysia Terengganu under International Partnership Research Grant ( UMT /CRIM/2-2/2/23 (23), Vot 55302) for supporting this joint project with Henan Agricultural University under a Research Collaboration Agreement ( RCA ). This work is also supported by the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia , under the Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE), Institute of Tropical Aquaculture and Fisheries (AKUATROP) program (Vot. No. 56051, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (10) and Vot. No. 56052, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (11)). The manuscript is also supported by the Program for Innovative Research Team (in Science and Technology) in the University of Henan Province (No. 21IRTSTHN020 ) and Central Plain Scholar Funding Project of Henan Province (No. 212101510005). The authors would also like to extend their sincere appreciation to the University of Tehran and the Biofuel Research Team (BRTeam) for their support throughout this project. Governmental support plans, such as financial incentives, pricing strategies, and subsidy programs in progressing towards using biofuels, have appeared as a recent and ongoing subject area of BSC research. Due to the increasing public awareness of global warming, many governments provide monetary incentives to replace biofuels with fossil fuels (Denizel et al., 2020). In this regard, the role of governments to promote and encourage using biofuels through developing various incentive programs is indispensable. Wu et al. (2021) highlighted the urgent need for more investigations to effectively guide the government incentive programs for biomass supply chain management and coordination and alliance of profit distribution issues. Haji Esmaeili et al. (2020), in another research, recommended providing financial incentives to motivate producers of the first-generation bioethanol to switch to the second-generation bioethanol production due to serious food versus fuel debates resulting from the first-generation biofuel production. Moreover, risk mitigation strategies and policies are required to tackle the evolving and fluctuating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the sustainability of biomass supply chains (Sajid, 2021) towards achieving sustainable development (Ameli et al., 2022; Ranjbari et al., 2021b). The research in this domain has been mainly focused on waste-to-energy incentive policy design (Zhao and You, 2019), and carbon-pricing strategies (D?az-Trujillo et al., 2019).The authors would like to thank Universiti Malaysia Terengganu under International Partnership Research Grant (UMT/CRIM/2-2/2/23 (23), Vot 55302) for supporting this joint project with Henan Agricultural University under a Research Collaboration Agreement (RCA). This work is also supported by the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia, under the Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE), Institute of Tropical Aquaculture and Fisheries (AKUATROP) program (Vot. No. 56051, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (10) and Vot. No. 56052, UMT/CRIM/2-2/5 Jilid 2 (11)). The manuscript is also supported by the Program for Innovative Research Team (in Science and Technology) in the University of Henan Province (No. 21IRTSTHN020) and Central Plain Scholar Funding Project of Henan Province (No. 212101510005). The authors would also like to extend their sincere appreciation to the University of Tehran and the Biofuel Research Team (BRTeam) for their support throughout this project.
Keywords
- Anaerobic digestion
- Biofuel
- Biogas
- Biomass
- Circular economy
- Supply chain management
- Global Warming
- Fossil Fuels
- Plants
- Biofuels
- Carbon
