Chapter 13 - Alcohol Fuels: The biochemical route

Abstract

The extensive use of fossil fuels contributes to climate change and exhaustion of petroleum reserves. In this context, biologically produced alcohols (methanol, ethanol, propanol, and butanol) are considered an attractive renewable energy source that can lead the transition toward a post-petroleum era. Despite the considerable progress recently made on developing new microbes for the production of renewable biofuels, some challenges have still to be addressed for the efficient implementation of commercial production of bioalcohols. In this chapter, different biochemical alcohol production processes are described and reviewed. Furthermore, the use of new developed fermenting microorganisms has also been discussed.