Sustainable Energy: Assessing Biodiesel as a Viable Replacement for Petroleum Fuel

Sustainability goals have been at the forefront of political, economic, social, and agricultural discussions since 2015. The fuel industry and its impact on the environment, economy, and society is often the headline within most discussions. The modern century has hosted petroleum fuel as its leader, but with concerning environmental impacts, renewable and sustainable forms of fuel have been proposed. Biodiesel is a renewable fuel extracted from oil in crops. This paper compares and contrasts the potential for biodiesel as a sustainable alternative to petroleum-based fuel through various factors of consideration such as environmental impact, economic impact, yield, feasibility of societal implementation, and the time and labor of extraction and processing. To make biodiesel more competitive within the energy industry, genetically modified crops have been considered leverage for biofuel improvement. After researching and discussing both advantages and disadvantages, the ideas of algae-fueled biodiesel and mixed fuel were proposed to address many of the current drawbacks of biofuel. The possibilities of this new form of production are discussed as a viable solution to the growing fuel issue. This research paper aims to evaluate information on biofuel and petroleum fuel solutions through a comparative analysis to propose a potential solution to help reach UN Sustainability Goal 7, Sustainable Energy.