A wide range of technologies concerned with the cultivation,
harvesting, and conversion of algae into biofuels are currently under
development. Beside this, extensive research is being undertaken
to identify algae strains suitable for biofuel production, and
to genetically modify these strains to improve their yields. Consequently,
one would expect that any effort to extrapolate the environmental
burdens of algae-derived biofuels in the future would
be inevitably associated with a large degree of uncertainty. On
the other hand, it is of crucial importance to determine the extent
to which different algal biofuel production strategies can help mitigate
the emissions and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.
Such insights would allow for comparing different technologies
and subsequently guide the future research directions and resources
towards the promising ones. These issues together clearly
highlight the need to quantify the environmental impact of algal
biodiesel under present uncertainties surrounding various aspects
of algal biofuel production.