Dulce Maria Diaz-Montano

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter http://dx. doi. org/10.5772/55923

1. Introduction

The production and utilization of fossil fuels introduce several negative environmental impacts. Bioenergy and biobased products are not a panacea for these problems. However, the environmental burden from use of biorenewable resources is generally much less than from the use of fossil resources. Biofuels include fuels derived from biomass conversion, as well as solid biomass, liquid fuels and various biogases. Forest biomass, agricultural residues and energy crops constitute the three major sources of biomass for energy, with the latter developing into probably the most important source in the 21st century. Land use and the changes thereof is a key issue in sustainable bioenergy production as land availability is ultimately a limiting factor [1]. Biodiesel and bioethanol are the main biofuel. Biodiesel can be made from vegetable oils, microalgae, and animal fats; on the other hand, bioethanol is an alcohol made by fermentation, mostly from carbohydrates produced by sugar or starch crops such as corn or sugarcane, as well as from non-food sources such as agricultural residues. Nevertheless, these processes require as an additional step, prior to saccharification, making production a difficult and expensive. Using agave plants as raw material could be a viable alternative to bioethanol production.