Global Biofuels Alliance

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About Global Biofuels Alliance:

It is an India-led Initiative to develop an alliance of Governments, International organizations and Industry to facilitate adoption of biofuels.
A total of 19 countries and 12 international organizations have so far agreed to join the alliance, including both G20 members and non-member countries.
India, Brazil and the US are the founding members of the alliance.
This Alliance will be aimed at facilitating cooperation and intensifying the use of sustainable biofuels, including in the transportation sector.
Significance of the alliance
- It will place emphasis on strengthening markets, facilitating global biofuels trade, development of concrete policy lesson-sharing and provision of technical support for national biofuels programs worldwide.
- It will support worldwide development and deployment of sustainable biofuels by offering capacity-building exercises across the value chain, technical support for national programs and promoting policy lessons-sharing.
- It will facilitate mobilizing a virtual marketplace to assist industries, countries, ecosystem players and key stakeholders in mapping demand and supply, as well as connecting technology providers to end users.
- It will also facilitate development, adoption and implementation of internationally recognized standards, codes, sustainability principles and regulations to incentivize biofuels adoption and trade.

What is Biofuel?

It is a fuel that is produced over a short time span from biomass, rather than by the very slow natural processes involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as oil.
Different Generations of Biofuel
- First generation: It is produced from consumable food items containing starch (rice and wheat) and sugar (beets and sugarcane) for bioalcohols, or vegetable oils for biodiesel.
- Second generation: It is mainly obtained from non-food feedstocks such as forest/industry/agricultural wastes and waste or used vegetable oils.
- Third generation: It is known as ‘algae fuel’, are derived from algae in the form of both, biodiesel and bioalcohols.
- Fourth generation: Like the third generation, 4G biofuels are made using non-arable land. However, unlike the third, they do not need the destruction of biomass.

Q1) What is Algae?

Algae are a diverse group of photosynthetic, plant-like organisms that can be found in various aquatic and terrestrial environments. They are not true plants but belong to a group of primarily aquatic organisms known as protists. Algae can vary significantly in size, ranging from microscopic unicellular forms to large, multicellular seaweeds.

Source: PM Modi launches Global Biofuels Alliance.