Co-firing in coal power plants and its impact on biomass feedstock availability

Abstract

Several states have a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) and allow for biomass co-firing to meet the RPS requirements. In addition, a federal renewable fuel standard (RFS) mandates an increase in cellulosic ethanol production over the next decade. This paper quantifies the effects on local biomass supply and demand of different co-firing policies imposed on 398 existing coal-fired power plants. Our model indicates which counties are most likely to be able to sustain cellulosic ethanol plants in addition to co-firing electric utilities. The simulation incorporates the county-level biomass market of corn stover, wheat straw, switchgrass, and forest residues as well as endogenous crop prices. Our scenarios indicate that there is sufficient feedstock availability in Southern Minnesota, Iowa, and Central Illinois. Significant supply shortages are observed in Eastern Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, and the tri-state area of Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky which are characterized by a high density of coal-fired power plants with high energy output.

Impact of agronomic uncertainty in biomass production and endogenous commodity prices on cellulosic biofuel feedstock composition

“…As long as there is no cellulosic biofuel industry emerging in the south, no switchgrass or Miscanthus will be planted. There are large coal-fired power plants in the southern Part of the country (Dumortier, 2013a), and thus, there exists potential 60 x 10 9 L 45 x 10 9 L 30 x 10 9 L 15 x 10 9 L 60 x 10 9 L 45 x 10 9 L 30 x 10 9 L 15 x 10 9 L 60 x 10 9 L 45 x 10 9 L 30 x 10 9 L 15 x 10 9 L demand for bioenergy crops irrespective of a cellulosic transportation fuel industry. In addition, the southeastern part of the United States is part of an increasing trend of exporting wood pellets from the United States to Europe (EIA, 2014).…”

“…Advanced (or cellulosic) biofuels can circumvent the problem of indirect land‐use change and competition with other grain uses because it uses agricultural and forest residues as feedstock (Babcock et al., ; Carriquiry et al., ). As an alternative to transportation fuel production, cellulosic feedstock can also be used for co‐firing in power plants because of its suitability to serve as a substitute for coal (Brechbill et al., ; Khanna et al., ; Dumortier, ). Given the availability of biomass resources and the potential use for transportation fuel and electricity production, questions concerning the effects of cellulosic feedstock production arise.…”

Co-firing coal with wood pellets for U.S. electricity generation: A real options analysis

“…Currently, logistics are a major barrier to international trade of wood pellets , but as the industry matures this barrier may evaporate. Logistics is also a barrier in local biomass supply and demand (Dumortier, 2013).…”

The effects of uncertainty under a cap-and-trade policy on afforestation in the United States

“…Given q t , a competitive, price-taking equilibrium in terms of prices, demand, and cropland allocation can be derived. The calibration of R i (q t ) is described in detail in the supplementary information and has been used in previous literature [22]. Note that ∂R i /∂q t < 0, i.e., a reduction in available land for crop production increase net returns.…”