Energy 29 (2004) 1743–1771 www.elsevier.com/locate/energy Production of FT transportation fuels from biomass; technical options, process analysis and optimisation, and development potential Carlo N. Hamelinck a, , Andre ´ P.C. Faaij a , Herman den Uil b , Harold Boerrigter b a Department of Science Technology and Society, Copernicus Institute, Utrecht University, Padualaan 14, 3584 CH Utrecht, The Netherlands b Energy Research Centre of the Netherlands (ECN), ECN Biomass, P.O. Box 1, 1755 LE Petten, The Netherlands Received 28 March 2003 Abstract Fischer–Tropsch (FT) diesel derived from biomass via gasiﬁcation is an attractive clean and carbon neutral transportation fuel, directly usable in the present transport sector. System components necessary for FT diesel production from biomass are analysed and combined to a limited set of promising conver- sion concepts. The main variations are in gasiﬁcation pressure, the oxygen or air medium, and in opti- misation towards liquid fuels only, or towards the product mix of liquid fuels and electricity. The technical and economic performance is analysed. For this purpose, a dynamic model was built in Aspen Plus1, allowing for direct evaluation of the inﬂuence of each parameter or device, on investment costs, FT and electricity eﬃciency and resulting FT diesel costs. FT diesel produced by conventional systems on the short term and at moderate scale would probably cost 16 4/GJ. In the longer term (large scale, tech- nological learning, and selective catalyst), this could decrease to 9 4/GJ. Biomass integrated gasiﬁcation FT plants can only become economically viable when crude oil price levels rise substantially, or when the environmental beneﬁts of green FT diesel are valued. Green FT diesel also seems 40–50% more expensive than biomass derived methanol or hydrogen, but has clear advantages with respect to applicability to the existing infrastructure and car technology. # 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.  Corresponding author. Fax: +31-30-2537-600. E-mail address: carlohamelinck@yahoo.com (C.N. Hamelinck). 0360-5442/$ - see front matter # 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.energy.2004.01.002