Southeastern United States wood pellets as a global energy resource: a cradle-to-gate life cycle assessment derived from empirical data

Morrison, Brandon; Golden, Jay S.

doi:10.1080/14786451.2016.1188816

Cited by 12 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…calculated relative GHG savings for a unit of electricity in the United Kingdom (UK) generated using imported wood pellets from the Southeastern U.S. Röder et al (2015) evaluated emissions and impacts of imported wood pellets in the UK in an effort to identify critical steps necessary to maximize the emission reduction potential. Morrison and Golden (2016)…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life cycle assessment of co-firing coal and wood pellets in the Southeastern United States

Morrison

Golden

2017

Journal of Cleaner Production

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life cycle assessment of co-firing coal and wood pellets in the Southeastern United States

Morrison

Golden

2017

Journal of Cleaner Production

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“…Generally, these mills obtain biomass for the wood pellets from sawmill residues and other leftovers from higher value wood products (Morrison and Golden 2018). However, biomass for wood pellet production is also obtained directly from forests via thinning of tops, cull trees and brush, downed woody debris, and roundwood (logs) obtained from forests stranded from the market after pulp mill closures .…”

Section: Figmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, biomass for wood pellet production is also obtained directly from forests via thinning of tops, cull trees and brush, downed woody debris, and roundwood (logs) obtained from forests stranded from the market after pulp mill closures . Through their interviews with SE US pellet industry representatives, Morrison and Golden (2018) found that SE US pellet production scenarios range anywhere from 100% sawmill residues to 100% roundwood, fluctuating with available supply and demand.…”

Section: Figmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As a response to the EU's 2020 climate and renewable energy targets, national legislations and regulations provided monetary incentives to owners of biomass-based power plants (Dwivedi et al 2011, Goh et al 2013, EASAC 2017. The engineering necessary to retrofit an existing coal power plant to use biomass, either alone or through cofiring, is relatively simple, and the low cost of plant conversion helps make biomass an important bridge fuel for European power suppliers (Morrison and Golden 2018).…”

Section: Causes Of Recent Growth In the Wood Pellet Tradementioning

confidence: 99%

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Transatlantic wood pellet trade demonstrates telecoupled benefits

Parish¹,

Herzberger²,

Phifer³

et al. 2018

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ABSTRACT. European demand for renewable energy resources has led to rapidly increasing transatlantic exports of wood pellets from the southeastern United States (SE US) since 2009. Disagreements have arisen over the global greenhouse gas reductions associated with replacing coal with wood, and groups on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean have raised concerns that increasing biomass exports might negatively affect SE US forests and the ecosystem services they provide. We use the telecoupling framework to test assertions that the intended benefits of the wood pellet trade for Europe might be offset by negative consequences in the SE US. Through a review of current literature and available data sets, we characterize the observed and potential changes in the environmental, social, and economic components of the sending and receiving regions to assess the overall sustainability of this renewable energy system. We conclude that the observed transatlantic wood pellet trade is an example of a mutually beneficial telecoupled system with the potential to provide environmental and socioeconomic benefits in both the SE US and Europe despite some negative effects on the coal industry. We recommend continued monitoring of this telecoupled system to quantify the environmental, social, and economic interactions and effects in the sending, receiving, and spillover systems over time so that evidence-based policy decisions can be made with regard to the sustainability of this renewable energy pathway.

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“…Much has been written about the environmental issues of this increasing use of woody biomass for bioenergy, e.g., [1,7,[13][14][15], in terms of net climate change mitigation benefits, competition for land resources, and potential adverse side-effects on biodiversity and other ecosystem services. A large body of work has also quantified the life cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of wood pellets from short-rotation coppice (SRC) systems [16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25], roundwood [1,[26][27][28][29], logging residues [8,25,30,31], and wood industry residues [32,33], as well as the energy and transportation services from the international market of wood pellets, e.g., [28,30,[34][35][36][37][38]. Results, including the international trade of bioenergy products, usually suggest that the highest avoided emissions occur when wood pellets are used to replace energy systems from high-emission fossil fuel, such as coal e.g., [6][7][8].…”

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Energy and Environmental Aspects of Using Eucalyptus from Brazil for Energy and Transportation Services in Europe

2018

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The international market of woody biomass for bioenergy is expected to have a major role in future global scenarios aligning with a 2 or 1.5 • C target. However, the quantification of the environmental impacts of energy and transportation services from novel technologies and biomass production systems are yet to be extensively studied on a case-specific basis. We use a life cycle assessment approach to quantify environmental impacts of four bioenergy systems based on eucalyptus plantations established in abandoned pastureland in Brazil. The alternative bioenergy systems deliver energy and transportation services in Europe (cradle-to-gate analysis), including modern technologies for production of heat, electricity (with and without carbon capture and storage), and advanced liquid biofuels. We find that all bioenergy systems can achieve sizeable climate benefits, but in some cases at increased pressure in other impact categories. The most impacting activities are biomass transport stages, followed by eucalyptus stand establishment, and pellet production. An estimate of the potential large-scale bioenergy deployment of eucalyptus established in marginal areas in Brazil shows that up to 7 EJ of heat, 2.5 EJ of electricity, or 5 EJ of transportation biofuels per year can be delivered. This corresponds to a climate mitigation potential between 0.9% and 2.4% (0.29 and 0.83 GtCO 2 per year) of the global anthropogenic emissions in 2015, and between 5.7% and 16% of European emissions, depending on the specific bioenergy system considered. A sensitivity analysis indicated that the best environmental performance is achieved with on-site biomass storage, transportation of wood chips with trucks, pellets as energy carrier, and larger ship sizes. Our quantitative environmental analysis contributes to increased understanding of the potential benefits and tradeoffs of large-scale supply of biomass resources, and additional research can further improve resolution and integrate environmental impact indicators within a broader sustainability perspective, as indicated by the recently established sustainable development goals.Sustainability 2018, 10, 4068 2 of 18 combination with technologies for capture and storage of carbon emissions (BECCS) [3]. BECCS allows achieving negative CO 2 emissions, after energy and transportation services are used to replace fossil fuels. However, many studies alert to the fact that feasibility of large-scale deployment of BECCS has not yet been demonstrated, nor have its potential and risks been fully examined [1,[4][5][6].The international market of forest biomass in the form of wood pellets have increased dramatically in the recent years, with Europe being the main importer and North America the main exporter [7][8][9][10][11], mostly due the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) [12]. In this policy, the European countries aim to increase the share of renewable energy in their gross final energy consumption to 20% by 2020. Much has been written about the environmental issues of this increasing use of woo...

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Southeastern United States wood pellets as a global energy resource: a cradle-to-gate life cycle assessment derived from empirical data

Cited by 12 publications

References 29 publications

Life cycle assessment of co-firing coal and wood pellets in the Southeastern United States

Life cycle assessment of co-firing coal and wood pellets in the Southeastern United States

Transatlantic wood pellet trade demonstrates telecoupled benefits

Energy and Environmental Aspects of Using Eucalyptus from Brazil for Energy and Transportation Services in Europe

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