Techno-economic and environmental evaluation of lignocellulosic biochemical refineries : need for a modular platform for integrated assessment (MPIA)

Ethanol production from lignocellulosic residues has potential to significantly improve sustainability of biofuels for transport by avoiding land-use competition with food crops and reducing impacts related to agricultural inputs. However, high production costs remain bottleneck for large-scale development of this pathway. A huge potential exists in upgrading energy producing pathways into biorefineries in order to improve its economic...