Energy production from grassland – Assessing the sustainability of different process chains under German conditions

Rösch, Christine; Skarka, Johannes; Raab, K.; Stelzer, Volker

doi:10.1016/j.biombioe.2008.10.008

Cited by 91 publications

(49 citation statements)

References 2 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In the silage maize production systems, the different transportation distances due to the different yield potentials affect the net GHG emissions by less than 1% of the total emissions. The relative advantage of grass and silage maize as feedstock for biogas production has also been investigated for example by Rösch et al [35]. Similar to our findings, they found higher per ha GHG emissions of silage maize production compared to grass production, while the GHG emissions per unit electric energy were lower based on silage maize compared to grass.…”

Section: Ghg Emissions Due To the Production Of Biogas From Silage Masupporting

confidence: 91%

Comparative Advantage of Maize- and Grass-Silage Based Feedstock for Biogas Production with Respect to Greenhouse Gas Mitigation

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper analyses the comparative advantage of using silage maize or grass as feedstock for anaerobic digestion to biogas from a greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation point of view, taking into account site-specific yield potentials, management options, and land-use change effects. GHG emissions due to the production of biogas were calculated using a life-cycle assessment approach for three different site conditions with specific yield potentials and adjusted management options. While for the use of silage maize, GHG emissions per energy unit were the same for different yield potentials, and the emissions varied substantially for different grassland systems. Without land-use change effects, silage maize-based biogas had lower GHG emissions per energy unit compared to grass-based biogas. Taking land-use change into account, results in a comparative advantage of biogas production from grass-based feedstock produced on arable land compared to silage maize-based feedstock. However, under current frame conditions, it is quite unrealistic that grass production systems would be established on arable land at larger scale.

show abstract

Section: Ghg Emissions Due To the Production Of Biogas From Silage Masupporting

confidence: 91%

Comparative Advantage of Maize- and Grass-Silage Based Feedstock for Biogas Production with Respect to Greenhouse Gas Mitigation

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Restricting the production of dedicated biomass crops to arable land in order to prevent the conversion of permanent grassland could however aggravate the food/energy-conflict and stimulate increased iLUC. A potential way out of this conflict may be provided by using the natural or semi-natural grassland biomass directly for energy conversion (Rösch et al 2009;Bühle et al 2010). High biodiversity levels of semi-natural grasslands can only be maintained through continuous management and thus using the biomass yield from semi-natural grasslands could promote the sustainable management of such sites in areas threatened by farm abandonment .…”

Section: Nature Conservationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bioenergy from “surplus” land: environmental and socio-economic implications

Dauber¹,

Brown²,

Fernando³

et al. 2012

184

158

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The increasing demand for biomass for the production of bioenergy is generating land-use conflicts. These conflicts might be solved through spatial segregation of food/feed and energy producing areas by continuing producing food on established and productive agricultural land while growing dedicated energy crops on so called "surplus" land. Ambiguity in the definition and characterization of surplus land as well as uncertainty in assessments of land availability and of future bioenergy potentials is causing confusion about the prospects and the environmental and socio-economic implications of bioenergy development in those areas. The high level of uncertainty is due to environmental, economic and social constraints not yet taken into account and to the potentials offered by those novel crops and their production methods not being fully exploited. This paper provides a scientific background in support of a reassessment of land available for bioenergy production by clarifying the terminology, identifying constraints and options for ReseARCh ARtiCle BioRisk A peer-reviewed open-access journalJens Dauber et al. / BioRisk 7: 5-50 (2012) 6 an efficient bioenergy-use of surplus land and providing policy recommendations for resolving conflicting land-use demands. A serious approach to factoring in the constraints, combined with creativity in utilizing the options provided, in our opinion, would lead to a more sustainable and efficient development of the bioenergy sector. Unless the sustainability challenge is mastered, the interdependent policy objectives of mitigating climate change, obtaining independence from fossil fuels, feeding and fuelling a growing human world population and maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem services will not be met. Despite the advanced developments of bioenergy, we still see regional solutions for designing and establishing sustainable bioenergy production systems with optimized production resulting in social, economic and ecological benefits. Where bioenergy production has been identified as the most suitable option to overcome the given problems of energy security and climate change mitigation, we need to determine which bioenergy cultivation systems are most suitable for the respective types of surplus land, by taking into account issues such as yields, inputs and costs, as well as potential environmental and socio-economic impacts.

show abstract

“…As a result of increasing milk and meat productivity of animals, in suitable regions there is an increase of amount of fodder being produced from arable land (legume-grass mixture, maize). Because of this and other reasons (for example political and financial support for renewable energy) there has been in last 10 -15 years significant increase in usage of biomass produced from permanent grasslands for alternative purposes (Hohenstein & Wright, 1994;Prochnow et al, 2009aProchnow et al, , 2009bRösch et al, 2009). …”

Section: Productive Functionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example Fuksa et al (2006) presented data on total energy production of silage maize in range from 107.27 to 231.04 GJ ha -1 , depending on particular year and the way growth was treated to improve its protection against weed. Rösch et al (2009) set the production of energy from 66 GJ ha -1 (low-input grassland) to 119 GJ ha -1 (high-input grassland).…”

Section: Effect Of Fertilization On Primary Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%