This is an aside, but I recently learned about citeproc-lua, which adds CSL processing directly to tex and latex.

https://github.com/zepinglee/citeproc-lua

Now included in texlive 2022.

As that evolves more (there are still missing features), it could be another viable alternative.

On Wed, May 11, 2022 at 2:19 PM John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:
>
> The regular export is preferred for LaTeX (C-c C-e l o) is preferred for LaTeX export as it generates the LaTeX cite commands. The version in C-c C-e r p uses CSL for the formatting, not LaTeX, and it allows you to get nicely formatted results without using bibtex/biblatex as the citation processor.
> 
> John
>
> -----------------------------------
> Professor John Kitchin (he/him/his)
> Doherty Hall A207F
> Department of Chemical Engineering
> Carnegie Mellon University
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> 412-268-7803
> @johnkitchin
> http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu
>
>
>
> On Wed, May 11, 2022 at 2:15 PM Daniel Fleischer <danflscr@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Alessandro Bertulli [2022-05-11 Wed 19:41] wrote:
>>
>> > I'm going to post my setup in a minute. The
>> > point is: when exporting the org file to LaTeX (C-c C-e l o), a PDF file
>> > gets produced, but it doesn't process the citation keys. For example, in
>> > my file (see below), I got the key "acm:code" literally printed on the
>> > PDF file, in a bold font.
>>
>> Hi, org-ref uses its own export engine which you call via (C-c C-e r p).
>> Please try that and report back if there are still issues.
>>
>> --
>>
>> Daniel Fleischer
>>