Cepsa: Towards The Integration of Vegetable Oils and Lignocellulosic Biomass into Conventional Petroleum Refinery Processing Units

The Compañía Española de Petróleos S.A.U. (Cepsa) is an integrated, energy service company that is active in the entire petroleum value chain. This chapter presents the activities of Cepsa in the field of biofuels. It discusses in detail different case studies, ranging from the use of vegetable oils to produce diesel additives or hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) products to activities in lignocellulosic biomass. The use of vegetable oils as renewable raw material represents a viable and efficient alternative to current fossil‐based fuels. Thus, besides contributing to diminishing CO2 emissions‐having a neutral carbon cycle‐their H/C ratio is high, and their composition is similar to that of conventional fuels. In this respect, as long as the use of edible vegetable oils and food‐producing lands are avoided, the use of vegetable oils as renewable raw materials is a viable alternative for biofuel production.