Opportunities and barriers for biofuel and bioenergy production from poplar

Abstract Due to the growing demand for transportation fuels and concerns about the greenhouse gas emissions derived from the use of fossil fuels, the development of alternative fuels from renewable resources, such as lignocellulosic biomass, is of paramount importance. This is compounded by the fact that there are increasing pressures and limitation on available arable land for renewable biomass production, and therefore, how to obtain more biomass resources and how to make full use of these biomass resources are key issues. Poplar ( Populus spp.) is one of the fastest‐growing temperate trees in the world and is a very promising raw material for the production of biofuels and other bio‐based commodities. As the first tree species to have its genome sequenced, and significant continuing efforts towards resequencing of different species/varieties, poplar resources will undoubtedly pave the way for the targeted cultivation of new poplar varieties suitable for biofuel production. In this article, we summarized that the main problems faced by using poplar as a biomass resource for biofuel production are the inherent recalcitrance of lignocellulosic biomass, and highlighted the response status on improving the biomass yield and efforts towards developing efficient poplar varieties for biofuel production.