Future Perspectives of Effective Utilization of Biomass -Renewable Carbon Resource

Many biomass power plants have been build and operated because biomass power generation systems are considered to be renewable. However, biomass power generation has many drawbacks, resulting in much lower thermal efficiency and costly than wind and photovoltaic power generation systems. Unfortunately, simple combustion (including the combustion of biomass) has critical problems such as i) emission of CO₂ and other pollutants, ii) great reduction of economic value of raw materials, and iii) large exergy loss. In contrast, combustion has following strong points; I) high power, II) high temperature heat generation, and III) utilization for hygiene/sanitation purposes or aftertreatments of organic wastes. The integration of energy storage system with the biomass power plant for non-steady state operation is a promising method to balance the intermittent electricity supply by variable renewable energy and electricity demand. Pyrolysis and gasification of biomass (including organic wastes) with fixed/fluidized beds is an important technology for carbon recycle and biocarbon production.