Biofuels and Biorefining Volume 1 - Chapter 1, Biomass: The driver for sustainable development

In the last century, the use of energy in all the economic sectors has increased considerably, mainly due to the growth of population as well as changes in the lifestyle. Almost 80% of the total energy used in the world comes from non-renewable sources, as petroleum and natural gas. Nevertheless, the excessive use of these fuels has caused the climate change problem, as well as the drop in the production of fossil fuels; indeed, due to its non-renewable nature, the extraction of the available amounts of fossil fuels will be more expensive as time goes by. Therefore, in order to keep a sustainable growth of all economic sectors, alternative energy sources have been explored. From these sources, biomass is one of the most interesting, since it can be used to produce biofuels, chemicals, value-added products as well as bioenergy. So, biomass is considered as the main driver toward the sustainable development. In this chapter, the current situation on the energetic and transportation sectors will be described to justify the necessity to move to a biomass-based economy. Finally, future insights on the development of a biomass-based economy will be presented.