Fuel Biotechnology

The use of biological agents to convert relatively diffuse and inconvenient to use sources of energy, e.g., biomass and sunlight, into more energy-dense and convenient to use fuels, e.g., methane, ethanol, butanol, biodiesel and hydrogen, constitutes fuel biotechnology. Biomass is the total cellular dry weight or organic material produced by an organism (usually from CO2 and sunlight), while biologically produced fuels are usually called biofuels. In general, biofuels are aimed for use in transport as a substitute for the nonrenewable and rapidly declining fossil derived from petroleum. Biomass still contributes a large part (74%) of the energy needs of developing countries, while only about 2% of energy used by developed countries is directly obtained from biomass.