Introducing Green GDP as an Objective to Account for Changes in Global Ecosystem Services Due to Biofuel Production

Accounting for ecosystem services is necessary for sustainable processes or systems. Biofuels production impacts land use change and, thus, ecosystem services. However, studies that minimise loss of ecosystem services from biofuels are rare. Ecosystem service values evaluate services – in monetary units – that ecosystems provide and could naturally be integrated into decision-making processes. The concept of Green GDP emerges when these values are considered with nominal GDP, providing an economic objective for large-scale biofuel value chains. We consider a biofuel value chain for the United States that considers process economics, supply chain economics, and the value of ecosystem services in a holistic, integrated model. First, we consider a case study where the objective is to maximise the US’s Green GDP before considering a case study where the objective is to minimise the overall annual cost. Loss of ecosystem services of the resulting value chain range from 4.7% to 6.8% of the overall cost of the value chain. Gains in green GDP compared to gains in nominal GDP are lower by 12.0% when optimising Green GDP and by 13.1% when optimising only for value chain cost.