Renewable energy policies and competition for biomass: Implications for land use, food prices, and processing industry

Abstract

We use a mathematical programming model to examine the impacts of simultaneous implementation of two US biofuel and bioenergy policies on commodity markets and spatial distribution of future cellulosic biorefineries. The key findings based on our numerical simulation are: 1) the number and average annual production capacity of cellulosic biofuel refineries depend on the total renewable fuels mandate; 2) the mix of cellulosic biomass feedstock depends on the assumptions about the production costs of energy crops and the amount of cropland that can be used for energy crops, but regardless of the assumptions crop residues are the primary biomass source to meet the demand for biomass for biofuel production and electricity generation; and 3) the biomass production areas would surround either future cellulosic biorefineries or the existing coal-based power plants to reduce the costs of biomass transportation. These findings have important implications for biorefinery investors and provide valuable policy insights for the selection of Biomass Crop Assistance Program project areas.

Lignocellulosic biomass for chemicals and energy: an integrated assessment of future EU market sizes, feedstock availability impacts, synergy and competition effects, and path dependencies

“…The results for questions 4 and 5 (on the dynamics between lignocellulose‐based and crop‐based biofuels) reveal that the current capacity of the latter creates a need for a specific subtarget on lignocellulose‐based biofuels before they can enter the market. This is consistent with current efforts in the USA to force lignocellulose‐based bioethanol into the market . The results also suggest that crop‐based biofuels may be gradually phased out, but only when considerable efforts have been made to ramp up lignocellulosic biofuels, and against significant additional costs.…”

Combined alkali and hydrothermal pretreatments for oat straw valorization within a biorefinery concept

“…A target of 136 billons liters of renewable fuels (79 billion liters of the total volume obtained from lignocellulose biomass) by 2022 was established in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (USA). Nevertheless, the moderate development of cellulosic biofuel industry hinders a large-scale exploitation, being improbable to achieve this goal by 2022 (Chen and Önal, 2016). The scientific community is devoting great research efforts on improvement the techno-economic process of lignocellulose biofuels manufacturing which is reflected in the increasing published papers in this field (Akhtar et al, 2016).…”

The Future of the EU Bioenergy Sector: Economic, Environmental, Social, and Legislative Challenges

“…The growing demand in the market of energy crops, driven by renewable energy policies, is contributing to expand the agricultural sector at a global level (Chen and Önal, 2016;Gohin and Chantret, 2010). According to the OECD-FAO (2019), energy crops are the main source of first-generation biofuels, biodiesel, bioethanol, and biogas, and in fact they may be inputs to produce different types of energy products (Koçar and Civaş, 2013).…”