169,755 research outputs found
Socio‐economic opportunities from Miscanthus cultivation in marginal land for bioenergy
No full textSubstantial areas of agricultural land in south European countries are becoming increasingly marginal and being abandoned due to arid climate with prolonged summers and low rainfall. Perennial, lignocellulosic crops, such as Miscanthus, offer an outlet that couples agriculture with energy, creates employment, and increases profits from feedstock production in rural areas. This research paper follows an Input Output methodology and uses an econometric model to investigate the impact of crop yielding performance and marginal land to jobs and profit from the cultivation and supply of Miscanthus in low quality, marginal land in Italy and Greece. Two value chain cases are analysed: small scale Combined Heat and Power (CHP) and Fast Pyrolysis Bio Oil (FPBO). The cultivation of Miscanthus in both reference value chains exhibits good employment prospects, with smaller scale value chains creating more labour‐intensive logistics operations. The activities can also generate substantial financial profit especially with higher crop yields. Results show a pronounced relationship between profitability and crop yield for both reference value chains ‐ cultivation and supply operations become more profitable with increasing yield. It is, therefore, important to achieve higher yields through good cropping practices, while maintaining high levels of environmental sustainability
Assessment of the potential bioenergy demand for heat, and combined heat and power: the case of the UK residential heat sector
No full textWhere Can Bioenergy Heat Applications Be The Most Suitable? A Market Segmentation Analysis Of The UK Heat Market
No full textOverview of the markets for energy crops in EU-27
No full textAmong the key drivers that promote the development of one or other
market, in the short and long term, the following can be considered as the most important: regular energy crops’ feedstock supply and consistency in terms of quantity and quality, sustainable growth and environmental impacts, market demands and state of development, price competitiveness, and technological scale-up.
Taking these issues into account, this perspective is a concise review of the state of the energy markets in the EU27 in the light of policy demand, economic and environmentally sustainable options, and the optimum choices of energy crops from 2010 to 2030
Assessment of the potential bioenergy demand for electricity and CHP: the case of the UK
No full textBioeconomy and green recovery in a post-COVID-19 era
No full textThe spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has generated a health crisis and repetitive lockdowns that disrupted different economic and societal segments. As the world has placed hope on the vaccination progress to bring back the socio-economic “normal,” this article explores how the bioeconomy can enhance the resilience and sustainability of bio-based, food, and energy systems in the post-COVID-19 era. The proposed recovery approach integrates technological innovations, environment, ecosystem services, “biocities,” food, rural economies, and tourism. The importance of integrating culture, arts, and the fashion industry as part of the recovery is underlined towards building a better bioeconomy that, together with environmental safeguards, promotes socio-cultural and economic innovations. This integration could be achieved supporting communities and stakeholders to diversify their activities by combining sustainable production with decarbonization, stimulating private investments in this direction and monitoring the resulting impact of mitigation measures. Food systems should become more resilient in order to allow adapting rapidly to severe crises and future shocks, while it is important to increase circularity towards the valorization of waste, the integration of different processes within the biorefinery concept and the production of bio-based products and biofuels
The potential demand for bioenergy in residential heating applications (bio-heat) in the UK based on a market segment analysis
No full textHow large is the potential demand for bio-heat in the UK? Whilst most research has focused on the supply of biomass for energy production, an understanding of the potential demand is crucial to the uptake of heat from bioenergy. We have designed a systematic framework utilising market segmentation techniques to assess the potential demand for biomass heat in the UK. First, the heat market is divided into relevant segments, characterised in terms of their final energy consumption, technological and fuel supply options. Second, the key technical, economic and organisational. factors that affect the uptake of bioenergy in each heat segment are identified, classified and then analysed to reveal which could be strong barriers, which could be surmounted easily, and for which bioenergy heat represents an improvement compared to alternatives. The defined framework is applied to the UK residential sector. We identify provisionally the most promising market segments for bioenergy heat, and their current levels of energy demand. We find that, depending on the assumptions, the present potential demand for bio-heat in the UK residential sector ranges between 3% (conservative estimate) and 31% (optimistic estimate) of the total energy consumed in the heat market. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved
Bioeconomy Opportunities for a Green Recovery and Enhanced System Resilience
No full textThe COVID-19 pandemic is causing an unprecedented global health crisis and socio-economic upheavel and led to severe consequences well beyond previous crises of the last decades, which mostly were related to financial issues. COVID-19 caused sudden economic, psychological and parlty physical shocks to markets, social sub-systems (e.g. education, food, health), and people.
As a direct consequence, today, food security and resilience are at stake. The effects on biobased products and bioenergy (in particular, biofuels) vary and their role in the recovery (with possible changes in customer’s behavior) could differ as well.
The linkages of the bioeconomy to post-pandemic recovery with regard to impacts and possible responses are currently being discussed by many institutions and initiatives, even though there is currently limited data on the impact of the pandemic on the bioeconomy.
This report presents preliminary results based on initial analysis from the authors on knowledge synthesis on the EU bioeconomy system, trends, and perspectives of the future development towards 2030 and 2050
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