Navigating alternative diesel pathways for a diversified energy future: Biodiesel or renewable diesel?

Biodiesel and renewable diesel are leading petroleum diesel alternatives, but their differing pathways and properties create distinct trade-offs in engine compatibility, efficiency, and lifecycle emissions.

• Why it matters: Transportation uses liquid fuels where batteries and hydrogen can be limited, so near-term decarbonization depends on choosing biofuels with the right performance and scalability.
• What they did: This review critically compares biodiesel versus renewable diesel across feedstocks, environmental performance, process efficiency, and recent catalysis advances, including shifts between homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysts.
• The result: The framework clarifies deployment barriers and opportunities and highlights how market and policy forces in the U.S., Europe, and Asia shape scalable liquid-fuel diversification, with AI/ML noted for process optimization.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.