Biomass for renewable energy, fuels and chemicals

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dr' Donald L. Klass is Director of Research for Entech International, Inc., an energy and environmental consulting firm headquartered in Barrington, Illinois. He also serves as President of the Biomass Energy Research Association, a membership association in Washington, D.C. founded in 1982 by industry and university researchers throughout North America. He is a member of several research advisory boards and business development committees, and a consultant to industry and government, both U.S. and foreign. Formerly, Dr. Klass managed biomass, natural gas, and petroleum research and educational programs for the Institute of Gas Technology and the petroleum industry. Over a 40-year period, his R&D and commercialization experience has been concentrated on the conversion of virgin and waste biomass to gaseous and liquid fuels and chemicals, the development of petrochemical, refinery, and gas separation processes, the microbial production of substitute natural gas from biomass and single cell protein from methane and methanol, and the development of electroviscous fluids. Dr. Klass is the author or co-author of over 300 papers and patents in these fields and the editor of 27 books on energy and fuels. He received his B.S. in chemistry from the University of Illinois, and his A.M. and Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Harvard University. PREFACE The need for energy and fuels is one of the common threads throughout history and is related to almost everything that man does or wishes to do. Energy, in its many useful forms, is a basic element that influences and limits our standard of living and technological progress. It is clearly an essential support system for all of us. In the twentieth century, the subject did not receive much attention until well into the middle of the century, that is, the fossil fuel era, and then usually only in crisis situations of one kind or another. Until we were confronted with energy and fuel shortages that affected our daily lives, most of us assumed that the petroleum, natural gas, and electric power industries would exist forever. A bountiful supply of energy in whatever forms needed was taken for granted. An energy corollary to the economic law of supply and demand gradually evolved. In the early 1970s, the law's first derivative might legitimately have been called the law of energy availability and cost. The oil marketing policies of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries initiated the so-called First Oil Shock in 1973-1974 and changed, probably forever, the international oil markets and the energy policies of most industrialized nations. Oil prices increased dramatically, seemingly overnight. Markets were disrupted and short- ages developed. Crash programs to develop alternatives to petroleum-based fuels began in earnest in many parts of the world. Many of these programs continue today. Intensive research programs were started to develop renewable energy re- sources such as active and passive solar energy, photovoltaic, wind, and ocean power systems, and biomass the only indigenous renewable energy resource capable of displacing large amounts of solid, liquid, and gaseous fossil fuels. As a widely dispersed, naturally occurring carbon resource, biomass was a logical choice as a raw material for the production of a broad range of fossil xii Preface fuel substitutes. Environmental issues such as air quality and global climate change that many believe are related to fossil fuel consumption also began to come to the fore. The world appeared ready to resurrect biomass as a major indigenous energy resource for industrialized nations, as it had been up to the end of the nineteenth century. It now appears that biomass energy will displace increasingly larger amounts of fossil fuels as time passes. This book addresses biomass energy technologies and the development of virgin and waste biomass as renewable, indigenous, energy resources for the production of heat, steam, and electric power, as well as solid, liquid, and gaseous fuels that are suitable as substitutes for fossil fuels and their refined products. Biomass is defined as nonfossil, energy-containing forms of carbon and includes all land- and water-based vegetation and such materials as munici- pal solid wastes, forestry and agricultural residues, municipal biosolids, and some industrial wastes. In other words, biomass is all nonfossil organic materi- als that have an intrinsic chemical energy content. The history, status, and future expectations of biomass research, development, and deployment efforts are examined from the standpoint of the role of biomass in our global and national energy economy, the impact of biomass energy use on the environ- ment, its potential to replace fossil fuels, and the commercial systems already in place. The development of advanced technology and improved biomass growth and conversion processes and environmental issues are also discussed. One chapter is also devoted to organic commodity chemicals from biomass. Because of the special organization of most chapters, this book should serve as an introduction to the subject for the student and professional who wish to become knowledgeable about the production and consumption of biomass energy and its potential long-range impact. This book is also useful for energy professionals interested in some of the technical details of and references for specific biomass energy applications. One special feature of the book that will become apparent to the reader is that it is multidisciplinary in content and treatment of the subject matter, because many scientific and engineering disci- plines are directly or indirectly involved in the development of biomass energy. For example, the biological gasification of biomass is described in terms of its microbiology and biochemistry, but the practical use of this information for the design and operation of combined waste disposal-methane production processes for feedstocks such as municipal solid waste is also discussed. An- other example of the multidisciplinary nature of the book is the treatment given to biomass production. The study and selection of special strains of hybrid trees for use as biomass resources, as well as the advanced agricultural practices used for growth and harvesting in short-rotation biomass plantations, are discussed. An important feature of this book is the effort to discuss barriers that hinder biomass energy utilization and what must be done to overcome them. An example of one of the barriers is net energy production. Given that Preface xiii the prime objective of a biomass energy system is to replace fossil fuels in a specific application, the system cannot effectively attain this objective if the net energy output available for market is less than the total of nonrenewable energy inputs required to operate the system. Throughout this book, the International System of Units, or le Syst~me International d'Unit~s (SI), is used. SI is a modern metrication system of mea- surement consisting of coherent base and derived units and is used by many scientists, engineers, and energy specialists, Most major technical associations and publishers require that SI be used in their publications. Because of the United States' position as the world's largest energy-consuming country, com- monly used U.S. energy units, several of which are somewhat unusual, such as quads of energy (1 x 10 is Btu/quad) and barrels of oil equivalent (BOE), and their conversion factors are presented in Appendix A along with the definitions and conversion factors for SI units. This makes it possible for the reader who is familiar only with U.S. units to readily convert them to SI units and to convert the SI units used in the text to common U.S. units. In the text, common U.S. units are sometimes cited in parentheses after the SI units for clarification. ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to take this opportunity to thank several groups and individuals who helped formulate my thinking on the subject of this book. It may seem unusual to some, but the Institute of Gas Technology, an education and research institute that specializes in the fossil fuel natural gas, is where I first became interested in biomass after spending several years in the petroleum industry. IGT's policy, which was very close to one of academic freedom, and my association with colleagues in both research and education were invaluable in encouraging and stimulating me to structure and sustain a biomass research program. I also had the opportunity to develop the conference "Energy from Biomass and Wastes" that was started almost simultaneously with the renewal of interest in biomass R&D in North America in the 1970s. The conference was presented annually until I retired from IGT in 1992. Literally hundreds of researchers and project developers presented the results of their efforts at this conference. I learned much about biomass energy research and commer- cialization from these meetings. The exchange of new ideas and information always inspired in me fresh approaches to new projects. My association with the directors and many of the members of the Biomass Energy Research Association (BERA) and direct contact with the Washington scene as a result of this affiliation since the early 1980s had the same stimulatory effect. I thank all of my colleagues, many of whom are still involved in biomass energy development, for sharing their thoughts and expertise with me. Without their contributions to my "data bank" over a period of three decades, it would have been impossible for me to prepare this book. Finally, I want to extend a special thank you to Dr. Don J. Stevens, a director of BERA and consultant with Cascade Research, Inc. I invited him to review the manuscript of this book. He accepted and performed a superb job of providing me with an objective assessment and numerous suggestions. X'r CHAPTER 1 Energy Consumption, Reserves, Depletion, and Environmental Issues I. INTRODUCTION It is well known that developed or industrialized nations consume more energy per capita than developing or Third World countries, and that there is a correlation between a country's living standards and energy consumption. In general, the higher the per-capita energy consumption, the higher the living standard. However, the rapid worldwide increase in the consumption of fossil fuels in the twentieth century to meet energy demand, mostly by industrialized nations, suggests that the time is not too distant before depletion begins to adversely affect petroleum and natural gas reserves. This is expected to result in increased usage of alternative biomass energy resources. The potentially damaging environmental effect of continued fossil fuel usage is another factor that will affect biomass energy usage. It has not been estab- lished with certainty that on a global basis, there is a specific relationship between fossil fuel consumption and environmental quality. There is also considerable disagreement as to whether increased fossil fuel consumption is the primary cause of global climate change. But most energy and environmental specialists agree that there is a strong relationship between localized and 2 Energy Consumption, Reserves, Depletion, and Environmental Issues regional air quality in terms of pollutant concentrations and fossil fuel con- sumption. The greater the consumption of fossil fuels, especially by motor vehicles and power plants, the greater the levels of air pollution in a given region. These issues are briefly examined in this chapter to provide a starting point and a foundation for development of the primary subject of this bookwenergy and fuels from virgin and waste biomass. Special emphasis is given to the United States because it utilizes about one quarter of the energy consumed in the world. If. HISTORICAL ENERGY CONSUMPTION PATTERNS It was not too many years ago that humans' basic survival depended in whole or in part on the availability of biomass as a source of foodstuffs for human and animal consumption, of building materials, and of energy for heating and cooking. Not much has changed in this regard in the Third World countries since preindustrial times. But industrial societies have modified and added to this list of necessities, particularly to the energy category. Biomass is now a minor source of energy and fuels in industrialized countries. It has been replaced by coal, petroleum crude oil, and natural gas, which have become the raw materials of choice for the manufacture and production of a host of derived products and energy as heat, steam, and electric power, as well as solid, liquid, and gaseous fuels. The fossil fuel era has indeed had a large impact on civilization and industrial development. But since the reserves of fossil fuels are depleted as they are consumed, and environmental issues, mainly those concerned with air quality problems, are perceived by many scientists to be directly related to fossil fuel consumption, biomass is expected to exhibit increasing usage as an energy resource and feedstock for the produc- tion of organic fuels and commodity chemicals. Biomass is one of the few renewable, indigenous, widely dispersed, natural resources that can be utilized to reduce both the amount of fossil fuels burned and several greenhouse gases emitted by or formed during fossil fuel combustion processes. Carbon dioxide, for example, is one of the primary products of fossil fuel combustion and is a greenhouse gas that is widely believed to be associated with global warming. It is removed from the atmosphere via carbon fixation by photosynthesis of the fixed carbon in biomass. A. ENERGY CONSUMPTION IN THE UNITED STATES The gradual change in the energy consumption pattern of the United States from 1860 to 1990 is illustrated in Fig. 1.1. In the mid-1800s, biomass, princi- II. Historical Energy Consumption Patterns 3 PERCENT 100 80 ~ /I 60- 40- 20 ,~_ o~' ~' ~' ~,' ~ ' ~' ~ ' ~ ' ~' ~ ' ~ ~ ~ ~ '~~ 60 70 80 90 1900 10 20 30 40 1950 60 70 80 90 YEAR WOOD " COAL ~ OIL AND GAS HYDROELECTRIC x NUCLEAR ELECTRIC FIGURE 1.1 Historical energy consumption pattern for United States, 1860-1990. pally woody biomass, supplied over 90% of U.S. energy and fuel needs, after which biomass consumption began to decrease as fossil fuels became the preferred energy resources. For many years, a safe illuminant had been sought as a less expensive substitute for whale oils. By the mid-1800s, distillation of coal oils yielded naphthas, coal oil kerosines, lubricants, and waxes, while liquid fuels were manufactured by the distillation of petroleum, asphalt, and bituminous shales. Coal slowly displaced biomass and became the primary energy resource until natural gas and oil began to displace coal. In 1816, the first gas company was established in Baltimore, and by 1859, more than 300 U.S. cities were lighted by gas. Natural gas was no longer a curiosity, but illuminating gas manufactured from coal by thermal gasification processes still ruled the burgeoning gas industry. Natural gas did not come to the fore until manufactured gas was widely adopted for cooking, space heating, water heating, and industrial uses. Installation of a nationwide pipeline grid system after World War II for transmission of natural gas eventually made it available in most urban areas. After the first oil well was drilled in 1859 in Titusville, Pennsylvania, for the specific purpose of bringing liquid petroleum to the surface in quantity, produc- ing oil wells were drilled in many states. The installation of long-distance pipelines for transport of oil from the producing_ re~ions to the refineries and the natural gas pipeline grid signaled the end of coal's dominance as an energy resource in the United States. As shown in Fig. 1.1, the percentage contributions 4 Energy Consumption, Reserves, Depletion, and Environmental Issues to total primary U.S. energy demand in the 1990s were about 70% for petroleum and natural gas and 20% for coal. Biomass, hydroelectric power, and nuclear power made up the balance. It is noteworthy that since the advent of nuclear power, its overall contribution to U.S. energy demand has remained rela- tively small. Over the period 1860 to 1990, U.S. fossil fuel consumption correlated well with the growth in population (Fig. 1.2), but more revealing is the trend over the same period, in annual and per-capita U.S. energy consumption (Fig. 1.3). As technology advanced, the efficiency of energy utilization increased. Less energy per capita was consumed even though living standards were dramati- cally improved. Large reductions in per-capita energy consumption occurred from over 600 GJ/capita-year (102 BOE/capita-year) in 1860 to a level of about 200 GJ/capita-year in 1900. Per-capita energy consumption then remained relatively stable until the 1940s when it began to increase again. In the 1970s, energy consumption stabilized again at about 350 GJ/capita-year (59 BOE/ capita-year). This is undoubtedly due to the emphasis that has been given to energy conservation and the more efficient utilization of energy and because of improvements in energy-consuming processes and hardware. Because of the increasing efficiency of energy utilization, the energy con- sumed per U.S. gross national product dollar exhibited substantial reductions also over the period 1930 to the early 1990s (Fig. 1.4). The U.S. gross national 250 - 200 - 150 - 100 - 5o~~-~ • ~, ~ 0 t 60 70 80 ,EI.~ ~, ~,,,~, ~ zI )( I I I I I I I I I I I 90 1900 10 20 30 YEAR POPULATION, MILLION EJ/YEAR 300 100 80 60 40 -20 I I I I I I I I I I 0 40 1950 60 70 80 90 POPULATION x EJ/YEAR FIGURE 1.2 U.S. population and consumption of fossil fuels, 1860-1990. II. Historical Energy Consumption Patterns EJ/YEAR GJ/CAPITA-YEAR 100 700 80~_ - 600 500 60 400 40 - 300 ~.,j ~ :~ ~" - 200 ~< >< 20 x~._.,,.,~ - 100 0 I I t I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I l I I 0 60 70 80 90 1900 10 20 30 40 1950 60 70 80 90 YEAR • EJ/YEAR ,z GJ/CAPITA-YEAR FIGURE 1.3 Annual and per-capita energy consumption for United States, 1860-1990. GNP, TRILLION DOLLARS 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 5 0 '""''"l'"l"l"l'''"""l'''"~"ll'"l"a"l''''""ll" 0 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 YEAR MJ/$ GNP 30 25 20 15 10 x GNP TRILLION DOLLARS ~ ~ MJ/ $ GNP FIGURE 1.4 U.S. gross national product and energy consumption per dollar of GNP, 1994 dollars. [...]... source of fuels and energy for many years, it has become a renewable carbon resource for energy and fuels once again for industrialized countries and is expected to exhibit substantial growth in the twenty-first century In this chapter, the concept of virgin and waste biomass as an alternative source of supply for energy and fuels is examined and the potential of biomass energy and its market penetration... increased biomass energy consumption Canada, for example, consumed about 134,000 BOE/day of biomass energy, or 3% of its total energy demand in the late 1970s, and by 1992 had 29 30 Biomass as an Energy Resource: Concept and Markets increased consumption to 250,000 BOE/day, or 4.4% of total energy demand Although biomass energy has continued to be utilized in Third World countries as a source of fuels and. .. activity and interactions at all levels require the acquisition and consumption of energy and fuels, no matter what the living standards are It is simply a matter of increasing population and the apparent preference for energy-rich, high-quality fossil fuels Questions of where recoverable fossil fuel deposits are located and the size of these deposits are obvious How long will it be, for example, before... 26.7 aAdapted from Klass (1992) The energy consumption data for the countries in Table 1.3 and for the world's regions (U.S Department of Energy, 1994) were used for the calculations The factors for converting energy consumption in EJ to carbon dioxide emissions for oil, natural gas, and coal are 0.07098, 0.05076, and 0.08690, respectively, and were derived from the data in Appendix C The sums of individual... are for the end of 1990 (World Energy Council, 1992) The oil and natural gas data are for January 1, 1993 (Gulf Publishing Company, 1993) The reserves data for coal, oil, and natural gas are indicated in tons, barrels, and cubic feet, respectively, as published and were not converted to SI units The world average heating values for subbituminous, bituminous, and anthracite coals; lignite; oil; and. .. activities and new discoveries, which have generally been able to sustain proved reserves for several decades For this reason, and because changing economic conditions and technical improvements affect the assessment of proved reserves and the economic recoverability of oil from lower-grade reserves and unconventional reserves of tar sands and oil shales, calculation of the depletion time for several... be manufactured from biomass feedstocks This means that essentially all of the products manufactured from petroleum and natural gas can be produced from biomass feedstocks Alternatively, biomass feedstocks can be converted to organic fuels that are not found in petroleum or natural gas The practical uses of biomass feedstocks and the applications of biomass energy and derived fuels, however, are limited... that gradual depletion of oil and natural gas reserves can be expected to become a major problem by the middle of the twenty-first century Without preparation and long-range planning to develop alternative fuels, particularly nonpolluting liquid motor fuels for large-scale worldwide distribution and clean-burning fuels for power production in stationary applications, energy and fuel shortages could become... demand and population growth Presuming Professor Daniels' prediction that depletion of coal, oil, and natural gas is truly inevitable, it is still prudent to use these natural resources wisely This will help conserve our valuable fossil fuels and extend the time when depletion and the unavoidable rise in energy prices and shortages occur and become a fact of life The coupling of fossil fuel usage and. .. extreme is represented by China and India, which rank first and second in population Their respective per-capita energy consumptions were 4.4 and 1.7 barrels of oil equivalent in 1992, the smallest in this group of countries Of the three fossil fuels coal, oil, and natural gas coal contributed 78 and 60% to energy demand in China and India, while natural gas contributed only 2 and 6%, respectively This suggests . advisory boards and business development committees, and a consultant to industry and government, both U.S. and foreign. Formerly, Dr. Klass managed biomass, . the conversion of virgin and waste biomass to gaseous and liquid fuels and chemicals, the development of petrochemical, refinery, and gas separation processes,