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Biomass/Biofuels

Environmental use of biomass

With land wastage at present levels there should be commitments by governments to investigate improved usage to benefit the environment.

The common agricultural policy is the epitome of bad management and a scandalous waste of resources.

Biomass energy creation has been a known science for decades and its advantages over hydrocarbons dismissed due to the cheap cost of “conventional” fuels.

That tax payers should subsidise land wastage is a crime with present day problems involving green house gases and global warming.

It seems convenient to forget that emissions are only a direct result of the oil and gas that comes out of the ground.

The equipment, pipelines, transport etc. has used up an enormous amount of energy in their manufacture

What is Biomass/Bio Fuels ( 21 items )

Solid Biomass
Note: The terms biofuel, biomass, and so on, are often used interchangeably.Energy generated by burning plants grown for the purpose, often after the dry matter is pelletized. Energy crops are used for firing power plants, either alone or co-fired with other fuels. Alternatively they may be used for heat or combined heat and power (CHP) productionGas biomass (Methane)Anaerobic digesters or biogas plants can be directly supplemented with energy crops once they have been ensiled into silage. The fastest growing sector of German biofarming has been in the area of "Renewable Energy Crops" (Nachwachsender Rohstoff = "NaWaRo") on nearly 500,000 ha land (2006). Energy crops can also be grown to boost gas yields where feedstocks have a low energy content, such as manures and spoiled grain. It is estimated that the energy yield presently of bioenergy crops converted via silage to methane is about 2 GWh/km². Small mixed cropping enterprises with animals can use a portion of their acreage to grow and convert energy crops and sustain the entire farms energy requirements with about 1/5 the acreage. In Europe and especially Germany, however, this rapid growth has occurred only with substantial government support, as in the German bonus system for renewable energy (ranging from €0.02-€0.16/kWh made from renewable sources). Similar developments of integrating crop farming and bioenergy production via silage-methane have been almost entirely overlooked in N. America, where political and structural issues and a huge continued push to centralize energy production has overshadowed positive developments.
Liquid biomass
Biodiesel
European production of biodiesel from energy crops has grown steadily in the last decade, principally focused on rapeseed used for oil and energy. In North America rapeseed was renamed "Canada Oil = Canola". Production of oil/biodiesel from rape covers more than 12,000 km² in Germany alone, and has doubled in the past 15 years. Typical yield of oil as pure biodiesel may be is 100,000 L/km² or more, making biodiesel crops economically attractive, provided sustainable crop rotations exist that are nutrient-balanced and preventative of the spread of disease such as clubroot. Biodiesel yield of soybeans is significantly lower than that of rape.
Bioethanol
Energy crops for biobutanol are grasses. A non-food crop for the production of cellulosic bioethanol is switchgrass. There has been a preoccupation with cellulosic bioethanol in America as the agricultural structure supporting biomethane is absent in many regions, with no credits or bonus system in place. Consequently a lot of private money and investor hopes are being pinned on marketable and patentable innovations in enzyme hydrolysis and the like and therefore America is viewed by some technology planners as falling further behind Europe in real bioenenergy gains.Bioethanol also refers to the technology of using animal and human grains, principally corn (maize seed) to make ethanol directly through fermentation, a process that is widely reputed to consume as much energy as it produces, therefore being non-sustainable. New developments in converting grain stillage (referred to as distillers grain stillage or DGS) into biogas energy looks promising as a means to improve the poor energy ratio of this type of bioethanol process. 2007 saw a setback in the economics of building grain refineries in the USA while the shipment of grains and ethanol by rail car has prompted the train industries largest growth phase since 50 years.
Human involvement in Eco disasters ( 5 items )

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