Biomass Feedstocks Research

DomesticFuel.com
Posted by Cindy Zimmerman – October 6th, 2009

USDA’s Agricultural Research Service is studying the use of plant residues for biofuels.

At the University of Minnesota-Morris Biomass Gasification Facility, for example, gasification researcher Jim Barbour and ARS soil scientist Jane Johnson (pictured) are evaluating potential biomass feedstocks, including pressed corn stover.

The Agricultural Research Service has scientists in 18 states involved in the Renewable Energy Assessment Project (REAP) which is trying to determine the balance between how much crop residue can be used to produce ethanol and other biofuels and how much should be left on the ground to protect soil from erosion, maintain soil organisms, and store carbon in the soil.

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OriginOil Announces the Completion of Phase 1 Research Project with Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory

Business Wire.com
October 07, 2009 05:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Senior scientist applauds collaboration leading to first-ever presentation of productivity model

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--OriginOil, Inc. (OOIL), the developer of a breakthrough technology to transform algae, the most promising source of renewable oil, into a true competitor to petroleum, today announced the completion of Phase 1 of a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory (INL).

OriginOil has been working with INL to develop a process model for the commercial production of algae for biofuels and other value-added products. Phase 1 of the CRADA focused on developing a comprehensive mass-energy balance of OriginOil's proprietary process. This helped the company develop its comprehensive productivity model recently presented to the National Algae Association's Quarterly Forum in Houston, Texas. INL researchers provided core data on the projected efficiency and recovery values for the various steps involved in the algae-growing process, including lipid and biomass production from algae.

"Algae represent a potential key biomass resource for a sustainable bioenergy industry," said Tom Ulrich, INL Senior Advisory Scientist. "Collaboration with OriginOil has been encouraging, especially the modeling of their algae growth and production process. Phase 2 of the CRADA will focus on further process validation, economic modeling and improved biomass logistics for the scale up of algae biomass production."

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Biofuel Producers Form Association to Address Inequities

Environmental Protection online
Oct 05, 2009

Advanced biofuel producers have formed the Low Carbon Synthetic Fuels Association (LCSFA), with members including TRI, Rentech Inc., Velocys, Choren, Flambeau River Biofuels/Johnson Timber, AP Fuels and World GTL.

The LCSFA was formed to address existing legislative and regulatory inequities that have slowed or even hindered the development of advanced biofuels. To date, federal programs have resulted in incentives that do not necessarily promote or reward the best performing and most environmentally friendly fuels.

Specifically, the LCSFA represents the biomass-to-liquids (BtL) industry. BtL is produced through the gasification of renewable biomass and the subsequent conversion of the gasified biomass using the Fischer-Tropsch (F-T) synthesis process. The renewable fuels produced are predominantly synthetic diesel and jet fuel, which are nearly identical to current crude oil-derived fuels but cleaner. BtL fuels can be produced from abundant, non-food organic materials such as wood waste from urban recycling programs, paper mills or forestry residues. They are fully compatible with the existing fuels infrastructure, enhance engine performance, and reduce emissions.

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Vermont Forwards FIT, San Fran Looks to Small Wind

SustainableBusiness.com News
10/05/2009 12:03 PM

Vermont regulators last week published rules establishing what it calls a standard-offer program for medium-sized renewable energy programs in the state. The program will function like a feed-in tariff, guaranteeing purchase prices for power produced from solar, wind, biomass and other renewable resources.

As directed by the Vermont Energy Act of 2009, the Public Service Board is creating the program for qualifying SPEED (sustainably priced energy enterprise development) resources with a plant capacity of 2.2 megawatts (MW) or less.

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Advanced Trailer adds second university to research biomass drying, storage, handling

Biomass Magazine October 2009
Posted October 6, 2009, at 7:15 a.m. CST

Advanced Trailer adds second university to research biomass drying, storage, handling Texas entrepreneur Randy Hill announced Oct. 5 he has selected Iowa State University as the recipient of a grant to study the use of his patent pending Advanced Trailer to remove moisture from another potential biomass source, corn residue.

“The goal of this grant is to explore the possibility of the Advanced Trailer for drying freshly harvested cobs and corn stover,” Hill said in making the announcement. “This grant will provide research funding, along with the use of two Advanced Drying Trailers and a dryer during this year’s corn harvest. The research will measure load weight, load depth, propane and or natural gas consumption, electrical energy use, ambient temperature and relative humidity, drying air temperature, and airflow rate. We believe this testing will conclusively demonstrate that the Advanced Trailer for biomass is the key to drying and transporting corn residue that can help fuel biomass.”

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In Search of Wildlife-Friendly Biofuels

U.S. News & World Report
Posted October 5, 2009
By Jennifer Donovan

October 1, 2009—When society jumps on a bandwagon, even for a good cause, there may be unintended consequences. The unintended consequence of crop-based biofuels may be the loss of wildlife habitat, particularly that of the birds who call this country’s grasslands home, say researchers from Michigan Technological University, The Nature Conservancy, the University of Minnesota and elsewhere.

In a paper published in the October 2009 issue of the journal BioScience, David Flaspohler, Joseph Fargione and colleagues analyze the impacts on wildlife of the burgeoning conversion of grasslands to corn. They conclude that the ongoing conversion of grasslands to corn for ethanol production is posing a very real threat to the wildlife whose habitat is being transformed. One potential solution: Use diverse native prairie plants to produce bioenergy instead of a single agricultural crop like corn.

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Congress Dubs Energy Hubs Mostly Duds

Science Insider
October 5, 2009
by Eli Kintisch

The U.S. Congress is giving Energy Secretary Steven Chu enough money to launch three of his beloved Bell Labs—fewer than half of his request.

In his proposed budget for 2010, Chu wanted $480 million to start eight Energy Innovation Hubs, or "Bell Lablets," as he called them, to stimulate research in areas ranging from solar energy to new materials for the electric grid. Each would receive $35 million to get started, and $25 million more in each of the following 4 years.

Last week Congress poured semi-cold water on the idea. Conferees to the Energy and Water spending bill approved funding for three of the centers, two in energy efficiency and renewable energy and one in nuclear energy.

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Native grasses as biofuel aids wildlife

UPI.com

HOUGHTON, Mich., Oct. 2 (UPI) -- Using prairie plants to produce bio-energy would help bird populations threatened by the conversion of grasslands to corn, scientists in Michigan said.

"There are ways to grow biofuel that are more benign," David Flaspohler, an environmental scientist at Michigan Tech, said in the journal BioScience.

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The Biochar debate

EnvironmentalResearchWeb.org
Posted by Dave Elliott on October 3, 2009 12:28 AM

“There is one way we could save ourselves, and that is through the massive burial of charcoal” James Lovelock

Converting biomass into charcoal type char which can be used to improve soil fertility, while also trapping carbon dioxide, certainly has major attractions. Some energy is generated too. But a key issue is whether, in net climate terms, the loss of (some) biomass for direct conversion to energy is balanced by the gain from CO2 entrapment and extra CO2 absorption by more fertile soils- especially if the combustion route also used geo-sequestration i.e. CCS?

A parametric study of bio-sequestration by Malcolm Fowles at the Open University, suggested that from a global warming perspective we should displace coal with biomass if the latter’s conversion efficiency is much over 30%. Otherwise we should sequester carbon from biomass rather than generate energy.

However, this was only a preliminary study and he felt that a more comprehensive analysis might shift the balance more towards bio- sequestration. He did not include carbon savings from hydrogen and other pyrolysis products, or crucially from reduced soil emissions- that’s hard to assess after all. And costs were not included in his model, although qualitatively and intuitively he felt bio-sequestration should be cheaper than geo-sequestration by CO2 capture and storage. (Fowles, M. (2007), “Black carbon sequestration as an alternative to bio-energy’, Biomass and Bioenergy 31: 426-432, doi:10.1016/j.biombioe.2007.01.012)

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BurlingtonFreePress.com (Vermont)
By Nancy Remsen, Free Press Staff Writer • Sunday, October 4, 2009

Instead of thinking “yuck” when faced with shriveled brown apple cores, slimly spinach leaves and stinky chicken bones, Dan Hecht of Montpelier thinks “energy.”

“There is value to be derived from stuff we throw away,” he said.

In an age when finding alternative sources of energy is both a state and national priority, Hecht points to the potential in a squandered resource: food scraps.

For one thing, it’s plentiful, Hecht said: “Every city and town in America already possesses a major source of renewable energy, one that does not need to be mined, harvested, refined or transported long distances.”

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