 | Ghawar reserves update and revisions (1) | The Oil Drum: Europe | Do they have a 'responsibility' to supply us? |  |
41 comments on How a market for sustainable bio-energy is being developed
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
User login
Personnel
Editors
Contributors
Peak Oil Primers
Archives
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
- May 2007
- April 2007
- March 2007
- February 2007
- January 2007
- December 2006
- November 2006
- October 2006
- September 2006
- August 2006
- July 2006
- June 2006
- May 2006
- April 2006
- March 2006
Vital Trivia
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
GAIA Host Collective
Where is criterion 10?
10. When producing and processing of biomass the energy input (quality x quantity) consumed shall be lower than the output energy derived from the biomass.
Does it not need to be net energy compatible?
That is, it would need to use mainly low quality sources (solar, wind, hydro) rather than ultra-dense hi-quality hydrocarbons as energy inputs.
How about scaling (criterion 11):
11. The aforementioned criteria shall be adhered to (or exceeded) even when the production or processing of biomass is increased to a manifold in scale
That is, it needs to scale well to be useful.
BTW, I fear that the above (criteria 1-9, not to mention hypothetical 10-11) have almost no meaning if system 2 or 3 are employed on wide scale.
As such, I believe your comment "I have my doubts, whether companies will do so" is spot on. As unfortunate as that is.
Ah well, here's wishing for the best and fearing the worst :)
12. As long as biomass can displace (save)fossil fuels in electricity and heat/district heat production, it is only allowed to use biomass for transport fuels in order to gain experience in production, preparing us for the fossil scarce future.
The point is the simple, that combustion of biomass for electricity /district heat results in an EROEI of 4-6. Whereas biofuel from biomass gives an EROEI of 1.4 - 3.
As long as we have fossil it is far more energy and pollution efficient to use fossil for transport and biomass for electricity and heat. And be efficient- and conserve as much as possible.
As people in the middle ages found out, biomass is easily consumed and grows slowly.So it must be used wisely and extremely energy efficient.
kind regards And1
"Whereas biofuel from biomass gives an EROEI of 1.4 - 3."
Source?
Re Syntec, source? Here - one of many similar studies for corn/US
http://lfee.mit.edu/public/Groode_Current%20Corn%20Ethanol%20Results_Jun...
A recent LCA study in Denmark gave 1.4 MJ (wheat)biofuel for input of 1.0 MJ fossil. If we add the benefit of animal feed the figure goes to approx 1.7 MJ for input of 1.0 MJ fossil.
For Wood cellulose the figuers are a little Better.
As you might know the Danish biotech company Novozymes http://www.biomass.novozymes.com/files/documents/2007-05380.pdf is making enzymes for bioethanol from cellulose breakdown and the company has published energy data for the process.
I have seen oil drum values for Brazilian Ethanol on the production still higher.
But the everlasting problem for traditional bioethanol is that you have to ferment in water- heat water-and later you have to destill the ethanol. These steps are very energy intensive, with a lot of waste heat. Hopefully the effecivity can be oimproved- by gasification + catalyst , for example.
If you, however put your corn, wheat or straw- wood in a modern Danish domestic oven you will at least get 85% out as heat. If you put cellulose into a gas generator you can run a car with the fumes. This was done extensively in denmark in WW2 when Gasoline was almost non existent. Terribly polluting, but still transport.
LCA's of Danish Wheat crops gives approx 5-6 MJ out for each MJ invested in growing, fertilizers, machinery , crop drying and storing etc. Compared to this, bioethanol has a poor Energy return.
You can see a popular discussion of the dillemma on how to use biomass in this pesentation by Henrik Wenzel (Danish, I'm sorry but graphs are self explaining. http://www.tekno.dk/pdf/praesentationer/alternative-braendstoffer-6_Henr...
In Denmark we have been burning municipial waste for disposal and later for energy since ww2 and agricultural waste/wood waste for electricity and district heat for +/-40 years, so biomass/waste is integrated into our energy system together with other renewables like wind. Likewise the discussion of how to use biomass most efficient has been running on and off the last 30 years in Danish science.
The conclusion is so far. Burn excess biomass for heat and electricity and use fossil for transport as long as available. At that point Biofuel might be one of the options for transport.
This is all for now.
Kind regards/And1
Thanks And1.
I think it was the wording of the sentence that made for the confusion as the EROI numbers you cite, could not possibly cover 'all' biofuels derived from biomass.
And1 -
perhaps it should be noted here that while your Eroei figure quoted may be accurate for AGRI-biofuels,
it is far from accurate for the best of SYLVI-biofuels,
that is, biofuels produced from sustainable forestry,
in particular Coppice & Standards woodland.
The difference includes a total lack of inputs for
plowing, fertilizing, biocides, and, potentially, harvest/extraction by tractor,
as the latter is readily managed by oxen or horses to minimize counter-productive soil compaction.
While I'd agree that biofuels could in theory displace fossil fuels,
I wonder if you'd agree that this cannot and will not happen
unless & untill there is a global treaty limiting all nations' entitlement to release fossil fuel emissions ?
Regards,
Billhook
It's not ten. You see, most blokes, you know, will be listing criteria to ten. You're on ten here, all the way up, all the way up, all the way up, you're on ten on your criteria list. Where can you go from there? Where?
hehe.. Sustainable list going to 10?
Where could you go from there? Well..
Nigel: These go to eleven
Or better yet,
Nigel: Famous for it's sustain
The sustain..You could go and have a bite an'...aaaaaaaaa...you'd still be hearin' that one.
:)