United Nations sustainability development goals approached from the side of the biological production of fuels

Huge economic and technological leaps have been made since the start of industrial revolution in the 18th century and through developments in the last 70 years. Improvements in the production and quality of goods, increases in food production and advances in medicine have contributed to enhance human life expectancy across the world. The increase in human population, with the trend of people moving from rural zones to cities, the vision of large companies for instant global business and, the development and expansion of terrestrial, maritime and air transportation have led to a highly connected world. The current COVID pandemic has exacerbated the global universe and the ‘internet of things’ has arrived and plans to stay. During the first two decades of the 21st century, it has been estimated that terrestrial transport represents nearly 20% of all carbon emissions, and CO2 emissions linked to aircraft were calculated to be 2% of all human emissions (www.eee.e uropa.eu; Becken and Mackey, 2017). The continuous increase in CO2 in our atmosphere with current levels of 420 ppm – about 20% higher than 50 years ago, and other greenhouse gases has given rise to a silent pandemic. Some aircraft builders (e.g. Boeing) are planning to fly using 100% sustainable aviation fuels by 2030 and several companies have reported successful testing of biofuel aircraft (www.biofuels-news.com/Feb 2021). Global climate change could devastate our environment if a point of no return is reached, this would result in a shortage of food that leads to massive malnutrition, famine and, eventually end our civilization. Many voices, governmental and non-governmental, are asking for measures to ameliorate first the current situation and then to restore conditions that are compatible with sustainable life. The Kyoto Protocol and the more recently the Paris Climate Agreement call for the use of clean, green and renewable fuels to replace fossil fuels in all transportation areas (United Nations, 2016). The overall goal is to reduce petroleum energy dependence by more than 80% by 2050, a goal which requires multiple approaches – eolic-, thermo-solar, photovoltaic, wave power, bioenergy and others forms of renewable energy. No single means of making energy is sufficient to cover the world’s energy demands (Chen et al., 2017); however, when developed and used concurrently, these approaches may be sufficient to meet current and future demands. These alternative sources of energy can be sourced from sunlight (i.e. photovoltaic and thermosolar), wind, ocean tides, plant biomass and microbes (Hussain et al., 2017). Significant efforts are being made to reduce the Carbon footprint related to transportation and a number of measures are being taken to introduce electric and hybrid cars, hydrogen propelled trucks, trains and other heavy vehicles. However, due to the nature of the different means for transportation (terrestrial, maritime, air), different types of fuels have to be considered. Liquid biofuels for transportation already represent an alternative to replace not only part of the fossil hydrocarbons but also as a means to save carbon emissions and reduce toxic net emissions linked to gasoline and diesel combustion motors. Below, we analyse how developments in bioethanol comply with UN SDGs, and provide suggestions for more clean energy generation.