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THE Biofuel Thread pt 6

Discussions of conventional and alternative energy production technologies.

Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Carnot » Wed 14 May 2014, 16:14:05

Graeme,

Greencarcongress. What a source of BS. These guys are full to the gunwales. Nothing they ever write about ever pans out. Another crop of high yield BS with an un-costed price for jet fuel and a fantasy "could be" price. Could be not would be more realistic.
No-one, not one company, has even a small scale BTL project that works and in my opinion NEVER will have. Look at the feed, look and the products, and look at the thermodynamics. More than difficult. Impossible.
Remember Choren. RIP. At least we do not have to suffer that any longer.

Miscanthus. Let me see. This was the weed that BP made a big splash about in Florida. At a conference in 2012 in the Paris the BP idiot presenter could not even give a half realistic yield figure. I congratulated him on being about to grow 3 times what had previously be achieved as the high end yield. When questioned on nutrient requirements I had a very strange look.

I suggested that his data might need testing and that I had serious doubts that the project would be viable. This was met with some irritation, The best bit came 6 months later when BP scrapped the project.

What a surprise. Another failed cellulosic ethanol venture. Millions wasted on a process that has been promised for more than a century. It even beats nuclear fusion by a long, long way for non delivery.
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Wed 14 May 2014, 19:29:41

Growth of Biomass Far Outstrips Growth of Solar and Wind

If I asked you to think of renewable energy, what comes to mind? I imagine it is skyscraper-sized wind turbines, solar panels on suburban roofs, or massive hydroelectric dams. You probably do not think of burning wood or converting crops to liquid fuel to be used in cars. Yet throughout the world bioenergy remains the biggest source of renewable energy. In fact its growth in the last decade has been greater than or similar to that from wind and solar in most places, and those places include the European Union and the United States of America.


"Advanced" biofuels however may solve some of these problems, or they may not. And a recent report claims that cellulosic biofuels may become cost-competitive – there is always a report saying a technology will become cost-competitive by a particular date – by 2016. The recent IPCC WG3 report on climate change mitigation also gave what could be called a qualified thumbs-up to both large-scale bioenergy and bioenergy with CCS.


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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Sat 17 May 2014, 19:18:40

BIOMASS: THE SUSTAINABILITY CHALLENGE

Biomass covers around half of our total renewable energy consumption and is expected to also contribute to half of the EU 2020 renewable energy target. As the political discussion on energy security is ‘heats up’, biomass is being considered a primary fuel for replacing natural gas and district heating. But how sustainable is it? Scientific experts, policymakers and NGO and industry representatives addressed this question at the recent European Biomass Association (AEBIOM) conference in Brussels.

The difference between biomass and fossil fuels is one of time scale. According to the Biomass Energy Centre, if it is managed on a sustainable basis, biomass is harvested as part of a constantly replenished crop. This maintains a closed carbon cycle with no net increase in atmospheric CO2 levels.

However, the closed carbon cycle vision for biomass may not always achieved. Additionally, the question of sustainability goes beyond CO2 emissions alone – it includes other concerns such as biodiversity and food security.

At the AEBIOM conference, European Commission representatives reiterated the Commission’s conclusion that it is not necessary introduce binding sustainability criteria for solid and gas biomass in order to achieve the 2020 targets.


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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Wed 21 May 2014, 21:30:46

USDA Announces Support for Renewable Biomass Energy

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) today announced support for agriculture producers and energy facilities working to turn renewable biomass materials into clean energy. The support comes through the Biomass Crop Assistance Program (BCAP), which was reauthorized by the 2014 Farm Bill and will resume this summer.

The Farm Bill authorizes $25 million annually for BCAP, requiring between 10 and 50 percent of the total funding to be used for harvest and transportation of biomass residues. Traditional food and feed crops are ineligible for assistance. The 2014 Farm Bill also enacted several modifications for BCAP, including higher incentives for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, and narrower biomass qualifications for matching payments, among other changes.

“This initiative helps farmers and ranchers manage the financial risk of growing and harvesting energy biomass at commercial scale,” said Farm Service Agency Administrator, Juan M. Garcia. “Investing in agricultural and forestry producers who cultivate energy biomass and supporting next-generation biofuels facilities make America more energy independent, help combat climate change and create jobs in rural America.”


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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Tanada » Wed 21 May 2014, 21:45:45

pstarr wrote:
The Farm Bill authorizes $25 million annually for BCAP, requiring between 10 and 50 percent of the total funding to be used for harvest and transportation of biomass residues. Traditional food and feed crops are ineligible for assistance.
Residues? If not from food and feed crops, then from where?

What's $25 million down the drain anyway? The military spends that much on wrenches.


No sweat, I predict this is a give away program to fund big city yard waste collection and 'processing', nothing more than a political self serving program.
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To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Tanada » Thu 22 May 2014, 13:11:07

pstarr wrote:
Tanada wrote:
pstarr wrote:
The Farm Bill authorizes $25 million annually for BCAP, requiring between 10 and 50 percent of the total funding to be used for harvest and transportation of biomass residues. Traditional food and feed crops are ineligible for assistance.
Residues? If not from food and feed crops, then from where?

What's $25 million down the drain anyway? The military spends that much on wrenches.


No sweat, I predict this is a give away program to fund big city yard waste collection and 'processing', nothing more than a political self serving program.
Does the rosy net-energy return (100:1, better than Spindletop) include lawn-mower gasoline?


Of course not, the program isn't paying for that, the guy mowing his own yard is, and then also paying municipal taxes to get his yard waste hauled away so the municipality can collect the federal biofuel subsidy for collecting and hauling it.
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Pops » Thu 22 May 2014, 15:00:46

Miscanthus looks like a good thing, The Missouri Farmers Assoc (a co-op you'll note) tried to promote it as a co-gen fuel. They had problems with both the pelleted fuel absorbing moisture and then disintegrating as well as it burning too fast with coal. Sounds fixable.
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Thu 22 May 2014, 19:36:33

Renewable Wood Fuels, Part 2: Environmentally Beneficial or a Chronic Problem?

About 2.5 million U.S. Households currently use wood as their primary source of Residential heating fuel. Concerns have been apparently growing as to the possible respiratory health impacts on many Residents, particularly in more densely populated regions around the U.S. Possibly due to wood smoke particular material (PM) emission concerns or increasing access to generally cleaner and more cost effective heating fuel alternatives, the Residential Sector’s wood consumption has decreased very significantly in recent decades. A large part of the fuels-switching from wood-to-alternatives unfortunately involves primarily substituting fossil fuels, which increases U.S. carbon emissions. Also this fuels-switching trend does not mitigate most Resident’s health risks from wood smoke exposure. What are other feasible options to continue utilizing and possibly increasing renewable wood biofuels, and do so by substantially reducing current and future health exposure risks of potentially hazardous wood smoke PM emissions?


In Conclusion – The U.S. has an opportunity to significantly reduce its carbon emissions and substantially reduce the amount of wood smoke hazardous PM/HAP emissions many Residents are currently and will continued to be exposed to in the future. The solution should include making the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management more responsible and accountable for better managing U.S. forests. By harvesting and thinning existing dead and overgrown forests, the U.S. could feasibly expand the consumption of renewable wood biofuels by at least 200 Trillion Btu per year (50% increase in Residential Sector or 10% increase in U.S. total wood consumption). This is equivalent to reducing U.S. carbon emissions by 10-15 million MT per year (LPG displacement basis) or removing up to about 0.5 million light duty vehicles from the roads. .


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FERC: US added 20 MW of biomass capacity in April
Last edited by Graeme on Thu 22 May 2014, 21:18:07, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Thu 22 May 2014, 20:32:32

Queensland floods are good for the global environment due to rapid growth of the biomass .
Record rains turned Australia into a giant green global carbon sink

New research shows that semi-arid regions, such as Australia, will play growing role in Earth's carbon cycle


Record rains turned Australia into a giant green global carbon sink

New research shows that semi-arid regions, such as Australia, will play growing role in Earth's carbon cycle

Record-breaking rains triggered so much new growth across Australia that the continent turned into a giant green carbon sink to rival tropical rainforests including the Amazon, our new research shows.
And that had a global impact.
While atmospheric carbon dioxide still rose in 2011, it grew at a much lower rate – nearly 20% lower – than the average growth over the previous decade.

Almost 60% of the higher than normal carbon uptake that year, or 840m tonnes, happened in Australia.
That was due to a combination of factors, including geography and a run of very dry years, followed by record-breaking rains in 2010-11.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... arbon-sink
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Fri 23 May 2014, 19:00:32

Newly launched Wood Heat Association promises biomass industry boost

The Renewable Energy Association (REA) yesterday officially launched a new trade body to represent the fast-expanding wood heat technology industry.

Announcing the formal launch of the new body at the All Energy Conference in Aberdeen, Julian Morgan-Jones, managing director of South East Wood Fuels and interim chairman of the WHA, said the recent launch of the domestic Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) scheme made it "an exciting time for the wood heat industry".


Supporters of the biomass industry have long argued that wood heat technologies have the potential to slash emissions by replacing fossil fuels, particularly through district heat networks or by replacing off-grid oil-fuelled boilers.


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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Fri 23 May 2014, 21:39:58

There is a power plant in Qld that runs on Macadamia shells,they used to be a waste product.
http://www.power-technology.com/projects/suncoast-gold/

Sugarmills in Qld(and everywhere else) have been producing electricity for ages.
Burning the by products of sugar cane to to generate steam and electricity to process the sugar and export the excess to the grid.
https://www.ergon.com.au/ergonia/energy ... sugar-cane

The furnaces in which the bagasse has traditionally been burned for steam production have energy efficiency rates of approximately 60-65%; whereas it is possible to achieve efficiency rates of nearly 90%, with heat-recovery designs and systems to reduce the final temperature of combustion gases.
These traditional energy schemes were designed to obtain precisely the electrical power required by the factory as the steam produced by low-pressure turbogenerators passes through.
In order to produce surplus electricity at the sugar factory, steam consumption must be reduced in the process, furnace efficiency must be improved; and at the same time, steam generation pressure must be increased.
In this case, it is possible to obtain surpluses of up to 100 kw-hr per ton of milled cane, as proven by experiences on a large scale in Hawaii, Reunion Island and Florida.
New technologies currently in the development stage, based on gasification of the biomass and use of gas turbines and combined cycles, would make it possible to increase the generation potential of the sugar industry to levels approximately twice those mentioned above.

http://www.fao.org/docrep/005/x4988e/x4988e01.htm
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Wed 28 May 2014, 21:29:00

Biomass consumption needs to be sustainable. According to the following report, demand is not.

Imagine the UK was covered with crops used for biofuel. Multiply it by three.

That’s the amount of land and forest needed to meet Europe’s bioenergy demands according to a new report by the Vienna University of Economics and Business for Friends of the Earth Europe.

Supporters of biofuel argue it is a valuable energy source is used sustainably.

However the report warns Europe’s use of crops and wood for transport fuel, heating and electricity is set to double by 2030.

Campaigners want to limit the use of bioenergy to sustainable levels and ban crops from being used.

Friends of the Earth Bioenergy Campaigner Kenneth Richter said: “Europe’s hunger for bioenergy is out of control… Bioenergy has a role to play in bringing down climate emissions, but governments must focus on utilising waste materials rather than burning trees and food crops.”

Today EU ambassadors will meet in Brussels to discuss a cap on biofuels from food at 7%.


Could this little-known biomass generator start an energy revolution?

It could be the most important portable power plant you've never heard of. It's called the "Power Pallet" and it is essentially a combined biomass refinery and generator that fits on a single pallet and can kick out up to 20 kilowatts of electricity.


Basically, the Power Pallet works by burning available biomass, but before the fuel is fully combusted, the resulting flammable gases like hydrogen and carbon monoxide are spirited away to be used instead as fuel in a General Motors engine that works as an electrical generator. Walnut shells are among the best sources of biomass fuel that require the least amount of operation and maintenance supervision with a Power Pallet. Wood chips and coconut shells are next best and corn cobs or palm kernel shells are the most difficult to use.


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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Wed 28 May 2014, 23:23:05

Looks very similar to this
You burn what ever you have to make power.
http://www.pritchardpower.com/
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Re: Biomass Thread

Unread postby Graeme » Thu 29 May 2014, 19:01:11

More sustainable thermosolar plants thanks to hybridization with biomethane

The integration of biomethane in concentrating solar thermal power plants would facilitate the commercial introduction of concentrating solar power (CSP) technology in the energy market, reducing both financial and environmental costs. Researchers belong to the European consortium of the Hysol project, who is led by the ACS-Cobra company, with the participation of Universidad Politécnica de MadridUniversidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) researchers. Currently, they are studying the integration process of biomethane. In order to conduct the validation of this process, this project is expected to build a pre-industrial plant located at the cluster of thermosolar innovation of Manchasol.


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