Potentials and feasibility assessment of small scale CHP plants fired by energy crops in Puglia...

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Research Paper RDndashndashRural Development

Potentials and feasibility assessment of small scale CHPplants fired by energy crops in Puglia region (Italy)

A Pantaleo A Pellerano MT Carone

Dipartimento PROGESA Facolta di Agraria Universita degli studi di Bari Via Amendola 165 70125 Bari Italy

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history

Received 30 April 2008

Received in revised form

26 September 2008

Accepted 9 December 2008

Published online 31 January 2009

Corresponding authorE-mail address apantaleoagrunibait (

1537-5110$ ndash see front matter ordf 2008 IAgrEdoi101016jbiosystemseng200812002

The proposed work aims to assess the energy crop suitability of Puglia Region (Southern

Italy) the techno-economic feasibility of small scale CHP plants fired by energy crops and the

environmental performances of the proposed CHP plants In the first part of the work a GIS

model is defined and applied to evaluate the land suitability for energy crops in the Puglia

region In the second part a financial appraisal of small scale CHP plants under Italian

legislative framework (feed in tariffs) is proposed the two case studies of bio-oil fired internal

combustion engine (ICE) coupled to vegetable oil mill plant and fed by oil seeds (brassica

carinata seeds) and syngas fired engine coupled to a pellet production unit and fed by

herbaceous energy crops bales (fibre sorghum) are investigated In the third part the energy

balance and the CO2 emissions of the whole bioenergy routes are assessed in order to

calculate the costs for the community (in terms of subsidies) to save a tons oil equivalent

(TOE) of primary energy and to avoid a tCO2 in the atmosphere by these small scale routes

The results report a potential in Puglia Region of about 293 and 729 kt y1 of brassica

carinata seeds and fibre sorghum bales respectively the financial appraisal of the

proposed chains under the Italian legislative framework reports an internal rate of return

(IRR) of 38 and 17 respectively while the energy balance assessment reports an overall

efficiency of the bioenergy routes of 272 and 295 respectively

ordf 2008 IAgrE Published by Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved

1 Introduction related biomass transport costs the high investment costs

In achieving the target for EU fossil-fuel substitution

sustainable power generation and enhanced distributed

generation biomass can play a key role providing several

environmental benefits and increasing opportunities for

rural development (European Commission 2005 European

Commission 2006) However energy crops are not yet

exploited on a commercial scale for several reasons such

as (i) economic constraints due to the high biomass produc-

tion costs their competitiveness with traditional crops the

dispersion of the potential resource on the territory and

A Pantaleo) Published by Elsevier Ltd

of treatmentconversion facilities the complex access to

loans (ii) technical constraints due to the uncertainties on the

adaptation of dedicated energy crops to different pedocli-

matic conditions the complex logistics of supply including

biomass pre-treatmentstorage issues the low conversion

efficiencies of biomass power plants and the poor reliability

of novel technologies which are expected to provide higher

conversion rates (iii) managing issues such as the scarce

know-how about bioenergy facilities and mainly the chal-

lenge to merge the needs of industrial operators investing

in power plants who requires a secure as possible biofuel

All rights reserved


supply at minimum price and agricultural operators who

aim to maximize their revenues trading their products on

the basis of market opportunities and avoiding long term

biomass supply contracts (iv) legislative issues and in

particular the reliability and effectiveness of incentives and

support schemes and the complex permit procedures to

build bioenergy power plants (v) social issues namely public

acceptance A comprehensive overview of these aspects is

provided by Pantaleo et al (2007a)

The aim of this work is to address some of those chal-

lenges in an integrated approach for land planning

economic analysis and environmental impact assessment in

view of the Italian subsidy framework (Italian Parliament

2007a Italian Parliament 2007b) in force since January 2008

which offers particularly favourable subsidies to small scale

CHP plants (up to 1 MWe) fired by lsquolsquolocalrsquorsquo biomass (ie

produced within a collection basin radius up to 70 km from

the conversion plant)

The energy crops potential assessment proposed in this

paper is based on a previous work of the authors (Peller-

ano et al 2007) which was applied to Puglia region in

order to select the most promising energy crops and to

estimate the energy potential in different penetration

scenarios In this paper on the basis of these potentials

two possible small-scale energy crops to CHP routes are

assessed taking into account technical economic and

environmental issues The main results are the number of

CHP plants which could be installed in the region and the

maximum biomass remuneration from energy conversion

under different techno-economic scenarios Finally the

energy and CO2 emissions balance of the whole biomass to

energy routes is assessed in order to calculate the cost for

the community to save a tons oil equivalent (TOE) of

primary energy and to avoid a tCO2 emission when

implementing the proposed routes

The procedure is applied to the Puglia region (Southern

Italy) an area of 19500 km2 with a high percentage of agri-

cultural land (about 70 of the total area) and a Mediterranean

semi-arid climate The case studies of annual oleagineous

(brassica carinata) and herbaceous (fibre sorghum) energy

crops are implemented The proposed biomass treatment and

energy conversion routes are based respectively on an oil

mill plant to produce bio-oil for CHP by diesel internal

combustion engines (ICE) and on a pelleting plant to produce

a pellet to be mixed with the oil cake pellet produced in the

previous route in order to feed a gasifier coupled to a syngas

engine

- Energy crops selection- Potentials assessment

Energy conversion routes selection

Biomass supply

CHP plants nuMax biomass rem

Techno-economic plant parameters

Fig 1 ndash General flowchart of the procedure t

2 Methodology

The general procedure flowchart is shown in Fig 1 and each

step is commented in the following

21 Energy crops selection and potentials assessment

The most promising energy crops for the territory are selected

according to their ecological requirements A preliminary

database is thus created to collect all the energy crops

parameters and to select those species whose characteristics

match the regionrsquos pedoclimatic condition The steps of the

land suitability assessment are discussed elsewhere (FAO

1976 Pellerano et al 2007) In particular the first step consists

of the identification of the available land for conversion to

energy crops according to economic and environmental

impact criteria The adopted factors are the slope and the

actual land use type These data layers are used as Boolean

factors (yesno) to select only those areas with the required

slope and land use type On the basis of the ecological

requirement of each energy crop the following land charac-

teristic are collected (i) the mean monthly precipitation (ii)

the soil drainage (iii) the soil depth (iv) the soil texture (v) the

soil pH and (vi) the presence of carbonates The cartographic

data (pedologic map and climate map) are processed in order

to obtain one single data layer for each land characteristic All

the dataset are projected in the UTM WGS84 (zone 33)

projection system and transformed to raster data with a pixel

of 100 m applying the lsquolsquoNEAREST neighbourrsquorsquo algorithm Each

cell therefore represents a homogeneous unit with its quan-

titative land characteristic Having obtained a homogeneous

dataset each data layer is reclassified by coupling to each

energy crop and each land characteristic a land index (ranging

from 0 to 100) which is representative of the compatibility of

the land characteristic with the ecological requirement of the

crop Finally for each energy crop and each cell a composite

suitability score is obtained by means of the following

weighted linear combination of land indices

Fik frac14Xn

jfrac141

wjkFijk 0 wj 1 (1)

being

Fik the composite suitability score for the i-th cell and the k-th

crop

costs

mber uneration

Subsidies

Cost for the Community for TOE and tCO2 saved

- Energy balance- CO2 balance

Revenues from energy

o analyse the energy cropping systems

b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 0 2 ( 2 0 0 9 ) 3 4 5 ndash 3 5 9 347

Fijk the land index assigned to the j-th factor the i-th cell and

the k-th crop

wjk the weight assigned to the j-th factor of the k-th crop

n the number of land characteristics (6 in the proposed

methodology)

The composite suitability score is used to define the class

and the order of suitability by arbitrary cut-off points as

shown in Table 1

The biomass potentials are calculated by means of the land

suitability assessment results and the crop rotation tech-

niques selected

22 Energy conversion routes selection and techno-economic feasibility

The following factors are considered in order to select the

most promising energy conversion routes (size and tech-

nology) (i) biomass typology and availability (ii) conversion

plants reliability technical performances and investment-

operational costs (iii) subsidies available and local heatpower

demand (iv) logistic and managing issues related to the bio-

energy routes Moreover a biomass supply cost assessment is

carried out (production harvesting and transport) consid-

ering both the specific cultivation techniques and mechani-

zation level in the area of investigation and the transport

costs which are mainly related to the logistics of supply the

distance to the conversion plant the intermediate storage

dryingpre-treatment facilities and in turn the selected bio-

energy routes Finally a financial appraisal of the selected

routes is proposed based on the biomass costs the techno-

economic parameters of the routes (investment costs opera-

tional costs and plant efficiency) the revenues from energy

sale (heat and power) and from the subsidies available (feed-in

tariff) The main result is an estimate of the maximum

biomass remuneration from energy chains under the

proposed techno-economic scenarios

23 Environmental feasibility and costndashbenefitassessment

The energy inputs of the biomass route are calculated by

lsquolsquoCumulative Energy Requirements Analysisrsquorsquo including the

biomass production harvesting transport handling treat-

ment and the energy conversion stages The methodology

selected to perform the environmental analysis is LCA It is

a methodology used to assess all environmental impacts

associated to a product process or activity by accounting for

Table 1 ndash Land suitability classification and scoresattribution

Order Class Definition Score

Suitable S1 No significant limitations 81ndash100

S2 Moderately severe limitations 61ndash80

S3 Severe limitations 41ndash60

Not suitable N1 Currently unsuitable 21ndash40

N2 Permanently unsuitable 0ndash20

and evaluating the resourcersquos consumption and emissions

Both direct and indirect impacts and energy consumption are

assessed The proposed environmental assessment takes in

account only the CO2 emissions in the whole bioenergy routes

and not the other GHG emissions andor impacts

The energy analysis is performed using the software

program SimaPro 70 (Pre Consultants 2008) and the CO2 emis-

sions analysis is performed by means of emission coefficients

from literature (ie tCO2 per t diesel fuel consumed by agro-

mechanicalworks tCO2 per MWh ofthermal or electricalenergy

consumed in the treatment-conversion stages or tCO2 per km

covered by trucks in the biomassbiofuel transport stages) The

environmental performances are compared to the traditional

energy production routes from fossil fuels in order to calculate

theavoided CO2 emissionsand saved TOEThis benefit is related

to the cost for the community in the operation of the proposed

routes which is represented by the amount of subsidies avail-

able (feed in tariff which are in turn paid by the whole

community by means of a specific electricity purchase cost

factor) This analysis allows assessing the overall community

cost per tCO2 and TOE saved by the proposed bioenergy

routes The assessment does not include the further benefits

from small scale CHP routes development such as increased

distributed generation penetration level and rural development

3 Application


A literature review of the energy crops shows that few

experimental plots have been developed so far in Southern

Italy and that the most common energy crops generally

present high water requirements and as a result are not

compatible with the Puglia region climatic conditions Two

annual species are selected as more suitable for the region

fibre sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L Moench annual herba-

ceous crop) and brassica carinata (Ethiopian mustard oleag-

inous annual herbaceous crop)

Fibre sorghum is a C4 crop of tropical origin with no special

soil requirements and a high resistance to drought (Arsia

2004) nevertheless it requires at least 120ndash150 mm of precip-

itation during the dry season to achieve acceptable yields

(Baldoni and Giardini 1993) Due to its high water require-

ments the related suitable lands in Puglia are quite low

The suitability of alternative herbaceous annual species

such as switchgrass and giant reed more resistant to drought

should be also explored in further works even if the low yields

could be the main constraints of these crops (Sanderson et al

1996 Hallam et al 2001 Monti et al 2006)

Brassica carinata is an oleaginous crop native of the Ethi-

opian Highlands and highly tolerant of a wide range of

climatic conditions Its better adaptability and productivity in

the semi-arid temperate climate in comparison to brassica

napus (by far the most common rapeseed cultivated in

continental Europe) makes brassica carinata a promising oil

crop for energy purposes in Mediterranean areas (Mazzoncini

et al 1999 Cardone et al 2003 Bouaid et al 2005)

The GIS-based multi-criteria model for land suitability is

applied using the software ArcGIS 9 The available land for


conversion to energy crops is selected according to land use

(Caliandro et al 2005) and the slope derived from the Digital

Elevation Data (CGIAR 2004) The artificial surfaces irrigated

lands permanent crops and agro-forestry areas are excluded

being economically unsuitable for energy crops cultivation

Furthermore the woodland (forests and shrub) open spaces

(bare rocks burnt areas beaches dunes and sand plains)

wetlands and water bodies are excluded because of the

physical constraints The rainfed agricultural lands without

irrigation (except for a moderate irrigation aid if required by

the crop) and with a slope value less than 20 are selected

According to these criteria about 616000 ha 52 of the total

agricultural land of the region are considered theoretically

suitable for conversion to energy crops The selected areas are

evaluated according to the land characteristics for each crop

For this purpose each data layer is reclassified by means of

a land index and a score as described in (Pellerano et al 2007)

Finally the land indices are combined according to Eq (1)

Table 2 reports the land indices and weights used for the land

suitability assessment in the case of fibre sorghum and bras-

sica carinata respectively

32 Energy crops production costs

The biomass production and harvesting costs are reported in

Table 3 They are referred to the specific case of Puglia region

and obtained from official UNIMA (Unione Nazionale Industrie

di Meccanizzazione Agricola) agro-mechanical cost figures In

the case of fibre sorghum two aid-irrigation treatments are

considered (2000 m3 ha1) which are needed in most of the

areas of Puglia region to obtain an acceptable crop yield The

crop yield reported in Table 3 is obtained from literature data

(Cardone et al 2003 Panoutsou et al 2007 Gasol et al 2007)

for brassica carinata and (Worley et al 1992 ab Smith and

Buxton 1993 Hallam et al 2001 Arsia 2004) for fibre

sorghum but larger scale field tests are needed to confirm this

preliminary hypothesis

For each crop the reported yields are obtained by

a weighted average of highlow yield projections from litera-

ture on the basis of the percentage of land belonging to

suitability class S1 and S2 as from the land suitability

assessment results reported in Table 9

In the case of fibre sorghum the scenario of harvesting and

roto-baling of biomass is considered producing bales of about

450 kg Harvesting and baling cost figures are obtained by

personal communications from straw harvesting operators

and average production capacity of Feraboli harvesting-baling

machines

The further subsidies available for farmers as resulting

from the Common Agricultural Policy are neglected as they

are independent of the cultivated crop

33 Energy conversion routes selection and techno-economic assessment

On the basis of the typology of energy crops suitable for the

Region and taking into account the subsidies available for

small scale power plants (lt1 MWe) in Italy two bioenergy

routes are considered The first route consists of a 1 MWe CHP

plant fired by bio-oil from brassica carinata seeds mechanical

extraction and using a diesel engine for heat-power genera-

tion The second route consists of a 1 MWe CHP plant fired by

a pellet mix (fibre sorghum pellet and oil cake pellet residues

from previous route) and using a bubbling fluidised bed

gasifier coupled to a syngas engine

In both cases the biomass is harvested during a short

period (about a couple of months MayndashJune for brassica and

AugustndashSeptember for fibre sorghum) The high seasonality of

the biomass availability requires a proper logistics and storage

system which is by far one of the main technical and

economic issues when implementing bioenergy routes (Allen

et al 1998 Krishnan et al 2004 Rentizelas et al 2008) In the

proposed application the biomass is stored at the biomass

treatment plant by means of facilities available to store about

20ndash50 of the annual biomass supply in the case respec-

tively of seeds and bales The remaining biomass could be

stored using existing facilities near to the place of production

In particular Brassica seeds are stored in silos at 12 moisture

wb while fibre sorghum bales are stored in covered struc-

tures at 25 moisture wwb In order to achieve this moisture

content the herbaceous crop is left on the soil immediately

after the harvesting (in August) for some weeks in order to

ensure a proper baling process and to avoid fermentation and

dry matter losses The biofuel (bio-oil and pellet) storage need

is limited as it is converted into energy shortly after its

production For this reason a small storage both at the

treatment plant and at the generation plant in order to ach-

ieve an autonomous operation of 1 week is considered

The proposed decoupling of biomass treatment plant and

generation plant allows locating the CHP plants close to the

energy demand so achieving a higher value for the produced

electricity and the possibility to use both thermal and elec-

trical energy Moreover de-coupling could offer several

potential system configurations such as the option to serve

distributed generation plants by a large biomass conversion

facility in particular when small scale power plant systems are

available (such as ICEs) De-coupling achieves lower biomass

transport costs and investmentoperational costs for the

biomass treatment facilities because of economies of scale

Finally another advantage is given by the ability to store bio-

fuels as a buffer against shutdowns or as a fuel for peak-load

generating plant (Bridgwater et al 2002 Pantaleo et al 2007a)

The biomass transport scenario to the treatment and

conversion plants is based on a local-regional scale being the

maximum distance between biomass production centres and

treatment plants 70 km (this is the maximum collection

radius to be eligible for the feed-in tariff according to the new

Italian bioenergy subsidy scheme) The average biomass

transport distance is assumed to be 40 km both in the case of

delivery to the treatment plant and to the generation plant

The road transport costs between field and treatment plant

are based on the use of 20ndash25 m3 capacity trucks while larger

trucks (24 t capacity) are considered for the transport of the

biofuel to the generation plant Cost data from literature and

from personal communications of local operators are

considered In particular Caputo et al (2005) discussed the

influence of critical logistic aspects (namely specific vehicle

transport cost vehicles capacity specific purchased biomass

cost and distribution density) on the economic performances

of bio-energy conversion systems

Table 2 ndash Land indices and weights for fibre sorghum and brassica carinata land suitability assessment

Fibre sorghum

Drainagea Soil depth (cm) Textureb Carbonates CaCO3 pH Rain (mm) (JunndashAug)

Weight 010 Weight 020 Weight 005 Weight 005 Weight 01 Weight 050

Land index Land index Land index Land index Land index Land index

VPD 0 0ndash20 0 C 70 Low 100 3ndash43 20 44ndash80 0

PD 10 21ndash30 20 CS 70 Medium 40 44ndash55 80 81ndash100 30

SPD 30 30ndash50 50 L 100 High 10 56ndash65 90 101ndash110 50

MWD 90 50ndash100 90 LC 100 Very high 0 66ndash75 100 110ndash120 60

WD 100 100ndash200 100 LS 100 76ndash85 90 121ndash140 70

ED 80 LSC 100 86ndash90 50 141ndash150 80

S 90 nd nd

SL 90

Brassica carinata

Drainagea Soil depth (cm) Textureb Carbonates CaCO3 pH Rain (mm) (OctndashJun)



VPD 0 0ndash20 0 C 60 Low na 3ndash55 30 410ndash430 50

PD 0 20ndash29 10 CS 100 Medium na 56ndash65 80 430ndash450 60

SPD 70 30ndash50 80 L 80 High na 66ndash75 100 451ndash600 90

MWD 100 50ndash200 100 LC 70 Very high na 76ndash80 80 600ndash900 100

WD 90 LS 70 81ndash85 30

ED 70 LSC 100 86ndash90 0

S 60

SL 70

a Drainage VPD very poor drained PD poorly drained SPD somewhat poorly drained MWD moderately well drained WD well drained ED excessively drained

b Texture Cfrac14 clay CSfrac14 clay-sandy Lfrac14 loam LCfrac14 loam-clay LSfrac14 loam-sandy LSCfrac14 loam-sandy-claim Sfrac14 sandy SLfrac14 sandy-loam

bio

sy

st

em

se

ng

in

ee

rin

g1

02

(2

00

9)

34

5ndash

35

93

49

Table 3 ndash Energy crops yield and productionharvestingcosts

Fibre sorghum

Total cost of which 1215 V ha1

Agro-mechanical works 310 V ha1

Harvesting and baling 405 V ha1

Consumables 320 V ha1

Water 180 V ha1

Biomass yield (25 moisture wb) 15 t ha1

Production cost 81 V t1

Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1


Seed yield (12 moisture wb) 2 t ha1



331 Bio-oil conversion routeIn this route the biomass treatment process is based on

a decentralized oil extraction unit by mechanical pressing

having production capacity of 1 t seeds h1 oil extraction rate

of 32 seeds temperature before pressing of 60 C and

residual oil content in the cake pellet of 20 The technical

and economic parameters of the oil extraction plant are

obtained by literature data (Ferchau 2000 Ciaschini et al

2005 Riva et al 2006 Toscano and Foppa Pedretti 2007) and

personal communications from manufacturers (Bracco Srl

and Mailca Srl)

It should be noted that the oil cake pellet produced by

brassica carinata is not suitable for animal feeding because of

its content of biofumigants nevertheless it has high energy

content and could be used in the gasification process for

power generation mixed with other pellet from herbaceous

energy crops as discussed in the following Moreover the

potentials of agricultural residues from brassica carinata for

bio-fuels production have been neglected (more than 3 t ha1

according to preliminary experimental results carried out in

Cardone et al 2003 and Gasol et al 2007)

The energy conversion process is based on an ICE fired by

the bio-oil produced by the extraction unit This is a mature

technology having high conversion efficiency and quite low

investment costs (Riva et al 2006 Pantaleo et al 2007b) The

high viscosity of the bio-oil requires preliminary heating and

the main technical issues regard noise odours NOx emis-

sions and bio-oil storage The technical and economic

parameters of the generation plant are authorrsquos estimates

based on personal communications from manufacturers and

literature data (Peters and Timmerhaus 1991 Riva et al 2006)

Among the others data from the following manufacturers

have been assessed Wartsila Energiestro Elcos Luzzi Power

Mann and Caterpillar

332 Pellet gasification routeIn this route the herbaceous crop bales are chipped dried and

extruded in order to obtain a pellet suitable for energy

conversion by a fluidized bed gasifier coupled to a syngas

engine The low moisture content of the biomass (25 wb at

harvest) allows reducing the investment and operational costs

of biomass drying which are a relevant part of the total pellet

production costs (OPET 2002 CTI 2004 Toscano et al 2005

Pantaleo et al 2007c) Packaging costs can also be saved as the

pellet can be transported to the conversion plant by truck

without packaging The proposed pellet production capacity is

1 t h1 the technical and economic parameters of the plant

are obtained by literature data (CTI 2004) and personal

communications from manufacturers (Larus Srl Biocalor Srl

General Dies Srl) In particular the electricity consumption for

coarse chopping fine grinding and pelleting is assumed to be

150 kWh t1 in agreement with data from manufacturers and

literature review (Jannasch et al 2001 OPET 2002 Purohit

et al 2006) Moreover as the biomass is processed from baled

form straw shredding is the most viable approach for the

initial downsizing of the material reducing energy and pro-

cessing costs relative to conventional chaff-cutting systems

(CBT 1998)

Gasification is the selected energy conversion technology

coupled to the pelleting process This technology converts

biomass through partial oxidation into a gaseous mixture of

syngas consisting of hydrogen (H2) carbon monoxide (CO)

methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) (Higman and Van der

Burgt 2003 Knoef 2005) The oxidant or gasifying agents can be

air pure O2 steam CO2 or their mixtures Air while a cheap and

widely used gasifying agent contains a large amount of

nitrogen which lowers the heating value of the syngas

produced If pure O2 is used as the gasifying agent the heating

value of syngas will increase but the operating costs will also

increase due to the O2 production Partial combustion of

biomass with air or O2 can provide heat for drying the biomass

raising the biomass temperature and driving the endothermic

gasification reactions and generate water and CO2 for further

reduction reactions The heating value and H2 content of syngas

can be increased if steam is used as the gasifying agent in

which case the heating value of the product gas is about 10ndash

15 MJ (Nm3)1 compared with 3ndash6 MJ (Nm3)1 for air gasification

of biomass Pure steam or CO2 requires an indirect or external

heat supply for the endothermic gasification reactions Alter-

natively a mixture of steam or CO2 and air or O2 can be used as

the gasifying agent and the partial combustion of biomass with

airO2 provides the heat required for the gasification

There are three main types of gasifiers fixed bed moving

bed and fluidized bed gasifiers Both fixed bed and moving bed

gasifiers produce syngas with large quantities of either tar and

or char due to the low and non-uniform heat and mass transfer

between solid biomass and gasifying agent However they are

simple and reliable designs and can be used to gasify very wet

biomass economically on a small scale (Basu 2006) Fluidized

bed gasifiers which consist of a large percentage of hot inert

bed materials such as sand and 1ndash3 of biomass have been

used widely in biomass gasification Fluidized bed gasification

can achieve a high heating rate uniform heating and high

productivity (Van der Drift et al 2001) However in this case

the biofuel size moisture content and mass density should be

carefully controlled in order to achieve an optimal fluidized

bed operation In particular the biomass source proposed in

this research based on herbaceous crops harvested at 25

moisture content requires a preliminary pelleting route in

order to achieve a minimum biofuel density of 550 kg m3

The syngas can be used to generate heat and power like

natural gas by means of ICEs Comprehensive information on

Table 5 ndash Technical parameters of the biofuel CHP plants

Biofuel CHP plant Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification

Plant size 1 MWe 1 MWe

Electrical efficiency 39 27

Operating hours 7500 7500

Biofuel consumption 1850 t bio-oil y1 6450 t pellet

mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1

Oil cake consumption ndash 1629 t y1

Electrical energy sold to grid 751 GWh y1 753 GWh y1

Thermal energy sold to load 826 MWh y1 829 MWh y1

Table 6 ndash Economic parameters of the biomass treatmentplants

Biomass treatmentprocess

Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

2905 V (t seed)1 81 V (t biomass)1

Transport costs 8 V (t seed)1 10 V (t biomass)1


biomass gasification research development demonstration

and commercialization is reported by Kirubakaran et al

(2007) Wang et al (in press) EGN (2008) IEA (2008) In the

following a fluidized-bed downdraft gasifier coupled to

a syngas engine was considered in order to define the techno-

economic parameters of the plant and data from Energia

Natural de Mora Desi Power and Xylowatt were used in

combination with literature data (Bridgwater 1995 Dornburg

and Faaij 2001 Bridgwater et al 2002)

333 Techno-economic assessment and assumptions forfinancial appraisalIn Tables 4ndash7 the main technical and economical parameters

of the treatment and conversion bioenergy routes are repor-

ted The technical parameters are calculated on the basis of

engineering data from manufacturers The biofuel production

costs reported in Table 6 include both the annualized invest-

ment costs for the treatment plant and the annual OampM costs

In the case of gasification the biofuel is a mix of pellet from

sorghum (75) and brassica oil cake pellet (25) This

percentage is defined on the basis of the overall biomass

potentials of the Region reported in Table 9 In Table 6 the cost

of pellet produced only by sorghum is also reported in order to

allow inferring the performances of the pellet route fired only

by sorghum

As can be seen in Table 5 the crop land needed to feed

a bio-oil power plant is by far larger than in the case of solid

biomass In fact one of the main issues of the bio-oil route is

the large area required for energy crop growing followed by

the need to sell the by-product cake obtained from the oil

extraction In both cases storage is a key issue and also high

cost if intermediate storage systems are introduced so

causing a significatively higher biomass cost

The Levelized Cost of Energy (LCE) reported in Table 7 is

calculated according to

LCE frac14 Cthorn OE

V MWh1

(2)

being E (GWh y1) the electricity sold to the grid O (kV y1) the

OampM cost and C the annual investment cost given by the

expression

C frac14 Ir

1 eth1=eth1thorn rTHORNTHORNlkV y1

(3)

Table 4 ndash Technical parameters of the biomass treatmentplants

Biomass treatment Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Plant capacity 1 t seed h1 1 t pellet h1

Storage-drying losses 5 2

Extraction efficiency 32 ndash

Biomass consumption 6070 t seed y1 5441 t biomass y1

Biofuel production 1850 t bio-oil y1 4821 t pellet y1

Oil cake pellet productiona 4016 t y1 ndash

Biofuel energy content 3746 MJ kg1 1556 MJ kg1

a Oil cake pellet energy content 1675 MJ kg1 oil and fats

percentage 20

where r is the cost of capital I is the actualized investment

cost (kV) and l the economic lifetime (years) In the proposed

application a discount rate of 6 and a plant lifetime of 15

years are assumed In particular the plant lifetime is assumed

equal to the duration of subsidies (feed-in tariffs) Moreover

the actualized repowering costs after 8 years of plant opera-

tion is included in the investment cost reported in Eq (3)

The following assumptions are made for the financial

appraisal

ndash 15 years of operating life lsquore-poweringrsquo after 8 years zero

decommissioning costs

ndash total sales and cost of sales are held constant (in real 2008

value) for the period 1ndash15 years and in particular the feed-in

tariff is assumed 300 V MWh1 (according to the Italian

subsidy mechanism (Italian Parliament 2007a Italian

Parliament 2007b)) and the thermal energy is sold at

70 V MWh1 (according to the present avoided cost of

fossil fuel heat production)

Oil cake pellet pricea 150 V t1 150 V t1

Investment costb 873 kV 890 kV

Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV

Biofuel production cost 1665 V (t bio-oil)1 79 V (t pellet)1

Biofuel transport cost 5 V (t bio-oil)1 10 V (t pellet)1

Biofuel cost at plantc 825 V (t bio-oil)1 1835 V (t pellet mix)1

Biofuel cost at plant

(only sorghum)d1774 V (t sorghum

pellet)1

a Selling price for bio-oil extraction plant and purchase price for

pellet gasification plant

b No drying cost is considered for the pellet production route as

the input biomass has 20 moisture content

c In the case of gasification plant the biofuel cost at the plant

represents the cost of the pellet mix with oil cake pellet

d It represents the cost of the pellet produced only by sorghum

without mix with oil cake pellet

Table 7 ndash Economic parameters of the biofuel CHP plants

Biofuel CHP plant Bio-oil ICE Pellet gasification

Investment cost 1048 kV 3420 kV

Operation amp maintenance cost 1777 kV y1 1445 kV y1

Repowering cost (after 8 years) 524 kV 855 kV

LCE 249 V MWh1 240 V MWh1

Table 8 ndash Reference values of primary energyconsumption and CO2 emission levels for heat andelectricity

TOE MWhe1 02642 Based on Italian power plants average values

TOE MWht1 01296 Diesel boiler with 75 conversion efficiency

tCO2 MWhe1 07322 Based on Italian power plants average values

tCO2 MWht1 04979 Diesel boiler with 75 conversion efficiency


ndash a thermal load factor of 10 is assumed to calculate the

annual thermal energy sold to the load

ndash maintenance costs are held constant (in real 2008 value)

throughout the 15 years of life of the power plant

ndash capital assets are depreciated using a straight line depreci-

ation over 15 years

ndash the cost of capital (net of inflation) is assumed equal to 6

ndash corporation tax is not considered in the financial

appraisal

ndash capital investments and income do not benefit from any of

the available national support mechanisms

34 Energy and CO2 emissions balance

An energy and CO2 emission balance of the whole bioenergy

routes is carried out In particular the methods used in the life

cycle inventory of the agricultural phase are mainly based on

the Life Cycle Inventories of Agricultural Production Systems

methodology (Nemecek et al 2004) and on the EU Concerted

Action AIR-CT94-2028 lsquolsquoHarmonization of Environmental Life

Cycle Assessment for Agriculturersquorsquo (Audsley 1997) The data

for generalized and standard production processes for inputs

such as fertilizers herbicides tractors utensils are taken from

the Ecoinvent Database (Frischknecht and Jungbluth 2004)

The characterization of energy crops (nutrients and heat-

ing value) is obtained from literature data (in particular Bal-

doni and Giardini 1993 Arsia 2004 Pellerano et al 2007 for

fibre sorghum and Baldoni and Giardini 1993 Cardone et al

2003 Arsia 2004 Pellerano et al 2007 Gasol et al 2007 for

brassica carinata) Structured interviews with local farmers

have been used to validate some data

Fuel consumption and emissions associated with transport

stages are obtained by quantifying the transport needs in

terms of MJ t1 km1 by means of the Volvo Truck Model

(Volvo Truck Corporation 2003) the density of the different

materials transported the specific fuel consumption and CO2

emissions and the average transport distance In particular

the density of the fibre sorghum bales is assumed of

400 kg m3 that of brassica seeds is 700 kg m3 and that of

pellet and bio-oil is respectively 600ndash800 kg m3 The overall

average transport distance between field and treatment plant

(milling or pelleting) and between treatment plant and

conversion facility is assumed to be 40 km

The energy consumption and CO2 emission assessment of

the milling and pelleting routes and of the energy conversion

ones is carried out considering the electricity and heat

consumption during the process and including the indirect

impact from plant construction The energy consumed and

CO2 emissions in the maintenance and repair of the plant

during its lifetime is also scored as part of the total balance of

the route The primary energy consumption and average CO2

emissions levels for electricity and heat production assumed

in the analysis are reported in Table 8 These values are also

considered when assessing the avoided energy consumption

and CO2 emissions in order to calculate the final energy and

environmental balances of the routes

4 Results and discussion

41 Land suitability maps and energy crops potentials

The final result of the GIS-based methodology is represented

by a digital geocoded map of suitable areas for each energy

crop (Figs 2 and 3) The maps specify the suitability class as

defined in the methodology The results show that the area of

Foggia (North) and of Bari (Middle-North) are the most suitable

for energy crops due to the higher presence of lands available

for conversion to energy crops (about 336600 ha and

129500 ha respectively) and the suitable climate conditions

Ethiopian mustard is the most suitable species for the region

(about 146700 ha of suitable land) this is mainly due to the

fact that this crop grows in the winter season when there is

more availability of rain water

Table 9 shows the conversion scenarios for each crop

considering the case of a rotation of 4 years Only the S1 and S2

classes are considered since the production cost for the

classes S3 and N1 would be too high while the class N2

represents the permanently unsuitable land

The results show that about 146 kha y1 of land could be

reasonably dedicated to brassica carinata growth corre-

sponding to about 293 kt y1 of seeds This potential could fire

48 CHP plants of 1 MWe size taking in account the crop yield

of Table 3 and the technical treatment and conversion plant

parameters of Tables 4 and 5 Most of these plants could be

installed in the province of Foggia (25) and Bari (11) The land

suitability for fibre sorghum is about 48 kt y1 which is about

13 of the case of ethiopian mustard However because of the

higher crop yield the biomass potential is about 729 kt y1

This potential mixed with the oil cake pellet produced from

the previous route could fire 124 CHP plants of 1 MWe size

Most of these plants could be installed in the province of

Foggia (81) and Bari (39)

42 Financial appraisal

The main results of the financial appraisal of the investment

are reported in Table 10 As shown in Table 7 the solid

biomass power plant presents an investment cost signifi-

cantly higher than in the case of liquid biomass as one

Fig 2 ndash Land Suitability Map for fibre sorghum Land suitability classes S1 S2 and S3 are defined in Table 1


advantage of the bio-oil fired diesel engines is the modularity

and the low investment costs also in case of small scale

facilities Despite this the operating costs of the bio-oil routes

are higher than in the gasification plant mainly because of the

Fig 3 ndash Land suitability map for Ethiopian mustard Land s

higher biomass cost For this reason the LCE of the bio-oil

plant is higher than in the case of gasification plant Never-

theless the bio-oil option presents better economic perfor-

mances in comparison to the gasification option

uitability classes S1 S2 and S3 are defined in Table 1

Table 9 ndash Land suitability assessment results Areas withsuitability class S1 and S2 annual cultivated landaccording to the proposed crop rotation annualcumulative yield and number of plants which could beinstalled in each province of the region

Province S1 (ha) S2 (ha) ha y1 Seedt y1

Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124


The maximum biofuel and biomass remunerations repre-

sent the costs respectively of biofuel and biomass which

would equalize the actualized investment and operational

costs of the generation plant to the revenues from electricity

and heat sale These remunerations represent the threshold

values to set at zero the income from the power plant opera-

tion As can be seen the pellet gasification routes present

a ratio between maximum biomass remuneration and

biomass cost of 246 in comparison to the value of 123 for the

bio-oil route This result shows that the solid biomass chain

even if it presents lower economic performances in the

baseline scenario is less sensitive to a fluctuation of the

biomass purchase price which makes this route more secure

in case of high volatility of biomass costs Moreover the

maximum biomass remuneration that could be achieved by

this route should be compared with the market price of these

Table 10 ndash Main results of the financial appraisal of theinvestments


Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555

Max biofuel remuneration 1031 Vt (bio-oil)1 275 Vt (t pellet)1

Max biomass remuneration 3566 V (t seed)1 1637 Vt

(t biomass)1

Max biomass remuneration

biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1

Cost for community 1750 kV y1 1755 kV y1

PBTfrac14 Pay Back Time IRRfrac14 Internal Rate of Return PIfrac14 Profitability

Index NPVfrac14 Net Present value

products (for food animal feeding or other use) In particular

as regards brassica oil seeds the food market price by 2008 (for

brassica napus whose production costs and yields are roughly

comparable with brassica carinata but suitable for the food

market) exceeded 400 V t1 (while this value was below

300 V t1 by 2007) showing that the bio-oil route is not

a profitable route for the oil seeds producer at the moment

The maximum income for the farmer as a difference between

maximum biomass remuneration and production costs is

also reported in Table 10 it shows that despite the higher

economic performances of the biofuel route this is of poor

interest for the farmer (maximum income of 133 V ha1)

while the gasification route presents a very promising

maximum farmer income (1240 V ha1) even if a lower

economic performance in the baseline scenario

These farmer incomes could be compared to the average

income from traditional crops which are mainly grain grass

crops and clover crops ranging between 200 and 800 V ha1

In both cases the cost for the community to operate the

bioenergy route is almost the same being simply obtained as

the product of the subsidy (feed-in tariff less value of

electricity sold to the grid) and the annual electricity sold to

the grid

43 Sensitivity analysis

The results of the sensitivity analysis are reported in Table 11

In particular the internal rate of return (IRR) corresponding to

a 20 increase or decrease of the main technical and

economic CHP plant parameters is reported The main

parameters affecting the profitability of the investment are

the feed in tariff the net electrical efficiency of the plant and

the biomass supply cost In particular in the case of bio-oil

ICE a 20 decrease in the feed in tariff or in the net electrical

efficiency causes a negative NPV and the unprofitability of the

investment In the case of pellet gasification the same feed in

tariff and net electrical efficiency variation decreases the IRR

to 0 and 1 respectively which also means that the

investment is not profitable The effect of biomass supply cost

variation (ethiopian mustard seeds and fibre sorghum bales)

or biofuel supply cost (bio-oil or pellet mix) on IRR is higher in

the case of bio-oil ICE than pellet gasification route because of

Table 11 ndash Sensitivity analysis of IRR for the twoconversion routes

Parameter Bio-oil ICE(IRRfrac14 38)

Pellet gasification(IRRfrac14 17)

20 20 20 20

Feed in tariff 74 ndash 30 0

Net electrical efficiency 72 ndash 29 1

Biomass supply cost 4 66 14 20

Biofuel supply cost 10 63 9 24

Oil cake price 48 28 15 18

Global service cost 35 41 16 18

Heat load factor 39 37 17 17

Investment cost 38 38 12 24

Discount rate 37 39 16 18

100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1

Biomass purchase price t-1

Fig 5 ndash Pellet mix cost at CHP plant as a function of the

biomass purchase price and the oil cake pellet purchase

price (oil cake price 210 V tL1) gt(oil cake price

180 V tL1) A(oil cake price 150 V tL1) C(oil cake price

120 V tL1) -(oil cake price 90 V tL1) B(oil cake price

60 V tL1)


the higher purchase price of seeds on respect to biomass

bales In fact a 20 increase in the biomass purchase cost or

bio-oil purchase cost causes a decrease of IRR to 4 and 10

respectively which means that the investment is not profit-

able Similarly in the gasification route the IRR decreases to

14 and 9 when the biomass or pellet supply cost increase

by 20 with respect to the base scenario The oil cake pellet

sellingpurchase price is another important factor which

affects the bio-oil route profitability to a larger extent than in

the case of pellet gasification The reason is that the oil cake

pellet produced during the extraction process of a 1 t seeds h1

plant is enough to feed as a mix with sorghum pellet in the

percentage of about 25 more than 3 CHP gasification plants

(see Table 9) The other techno-economic parameter varia-

tions (investment and operational costs heat load factor

discount rate) affect the final investment profitability to

a lesser extent than the previous ones

In Figs 4 and 5 the variation of biofuel cost at the CHP plant

as a function of biomass purchase price and oil cake pellet

sellingpurchase price (according to the route) is shown The

graphics are useful to evaluate the effect of the biomass

purchase price on the biofuel cost at the CHP plant and this is

particularly relevant in case of high volatility of biomass

prices

It should be noted that the financial appraisal of bio-oil

system alone can be inferred from Fig 4 which reports the

bio-oil cost at different oil cake selling prices (independently

from the final end-user which could be pellet production

biofumigant or other possible applications) The possibility of

pellet route from sorghum alone can be inferred from Fig 5

which reports the pellet cost at different oil cake pellet

purchase price In particular an oil cake purchase price of

1425 V t1 would allow obtaining a pellet mix cost equal to the

pellet cost in the case of only sorghum (which is 1774 V t1 as

reported in Table 6)

In Figs 6 and 7 the maximum biofuel remuneration as

a function of the feed-in tariff and the electrical efficiency of

the generation system is reported for the bio-oil and pellet

route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1

Seed purchase price t-1

Fig 4 ndash Bio-oil production cost as a function of the seed

purchase price and the oil cake pellet selling price (oil

cake price 60 V tL1) gt (oil cake price 90 V tL1) A (oil cake

price 120 V tL1) C (oil cake price 150 V tL1) -(oil cake

price 180 V tL1) B(oil cake price 210 V tL1)


The LCA methodology is applied to the bio-electricity routes

previously described In Table 12 the saved TOE and avoided

tCO2 per year are shown considering the baseline emission

level of Table 8 As concerns the oil cake pellet the allocation

of impacts related to cultivation-harvesting of oil seeds and

their transport to the treatment plant to the bio-oil and pellet

routes is based on the economic value of bio-oil and oil cake

For this reason about 71 of the cultivation-harvesting

impacts and transport to treatment plant impacts related to

brassica carinata is allocated to the bio-oil route and the

remaining is allocated to the gasification route

The energy efficiency and CO2 abatement efficiency of the

routes are obtained as the ratio between primary energy saved

or CO2 emissions avoided and total energy input or total CO2

emissions of the routes As shown in Table 12 the biomass

200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500

150 180 210 240 270 300 330 360 390Feed in tariff MWh

-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1

Fig 6 ndash Bio-oil remuneration price as a function of feed-

in tariff and net electrical efficiency (electrical

efficiency 47) gt (electrical efficiency 43) A

(electrical efficiency 39) ndash (electrical efficiency 35) -

(electrical efficiency 31)

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1

Fig 7 ndash Pellet mix remuneration price as a function of feed-

in tariff and net electrical efficiency (electrical efficiency

32) gt (electrical efficiency 30) - (electrical efficiency

27) - (electrical efficiency 24) - (electrical efficiency

22)


cultivation and harvesting phases represent the actions with

the greatest energy consumption and CO2 emissions of the

whole bioenergy routes In the case of bio-oil the impact is

higher because of the lower biomass yield and the higher crop

land requirement As can be seen the biomass and biofuel

transport phases have a low impact on the total energy and

environmental balances On the contrary the biomass treat-

ment phase and in particular the pelleting and the energy

conversion processes provide a significant contribution to the

Table 12 ndash Energy balance and CO2 emission balance ofthe bioenergy routes

Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification

Energy balance (TOE y1)

Cultivation-harvesting 603 786 360 506

Transport to treatment plant 11 15 27 38

Transport to CHP plant 5 06 17 24

Treatment 67 88 182 256

Conversion 80 105 125 175

Total energy input 767 100 711 100

Primary energy saved 2091 2098

Primary energy saved (TOE GWh-1) 278 278

Energy saved balance 1324 1387

Energy efficiency of the route 272 295

Cost of energy saved (V TOE-1) 1322 1266

CO2 emission balance (tCO2 y1)




Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159

Total CO2 emission 1987 100 1792 100

CO2 emission avoided by the route 5909 5929

Primary energy saved (CO2 GWh1) 787 787

CO2 emission avoided balance 3922 4137

CO2 abatement efficiency of the route 297 331

Cost of CO2 abatement (V tCO21) 446 424

total energy and envioronmental balances The pellet gasifi-

cation routes present the best energy and environmental

performances mainly because of the lower impact of the

cultivation-harvesting phase This analysis shows that efforts

to improve the overall energy efficiency should be focused on

the cultivation-harvesting phase and in particular fertilizer

usage and fuel consumption However significant reduction

of fertilizers is not considered feasible as it would decrease

production yields A saving in diesel fuel by improving tractor

operating performance may be possible

The total primary energy consumption of the brassica

carinata and fibre sorghum cropping system are respectively

1166 and 1397 GJ ha1 A published study carried out in Italy

related to brassica carinata and including also the biomass

transport stage reports results that oscillated between 1927

and 2353 GJ ha1 depending on the intensity of cultivation

(Cardone 2003) and considering 15 higher fertilizer dose

than in this case while another study carried out in Spain

which considers 12 lower fertilizer dose than this case

study reports values of 1026 GJ ha1 (Gasol 2007) Other

literature data for rapeseed and sunflower which notably

present higher energy requirements than brassica carinata

report values for the agricultural phase in the range of 13ndash37

GJ ha1 (Bona et al 1999 Kallivroussis et al 2002 Venturi and

Venturi 2003) As regards fibre sorghum the literature

reports values in the range of 13ndash25 GJ ha1 (Worley et al

1992b Moncada and Grassi 1993 Venturi et al 1997 Venturi

and Venturi 2003 Monti and Venturi 2003) depending on

the intensity of the cultivation cropping techniques and

pseudo-climatic conditions In general the input in the

agricultural phase can be limited to less than 15 GJ ha1

without compromising the production level (Venturi and

Venturi 2003)

The energy consumption calculated is lower overall than

the cited reference The main difference is the lower fertilizer

dose applied to the soil since it has been fitted as the

minimum crop requirement

In the case of pelleting our figures of 1265 MJ (t pellet)1

are lower than Purohit et al (2006) who reports energy

input for pelleting route of about 1530 MJ t1 and also lower

than other literature data related to straw pelleting

(Novem 1996 King 1999 Samson et al 2000) mainly

because of the reduced amount of energy required for

biomass drying

Finally the cost for the community (in terms of subsidies)

per TOE of primary energy saved and tCO2 avoided are

respectively in the case of bio-oil route and pellet gasification

route of 1322 V TOE1 saved and 446 V tCO21 avoided and

1266 V TOE1 saved and 424 V tCO21 avoided These values

should be compared with those ones obtained by other energy

saving or CO2 abatement measures and technologies in order

to select the optimal support strategies to achieve the targets

To put it into perspective it should be noted that the value of 1

TOE saved in the Italian market of white certificates is about

100 V TOE1 (AEEG 2008) while the market value of 1 ERU

(emission reduction unit) is in the range of 20ndash40 V tCO21 this

implies that the cost for the community to achieve a primary

energy saving or CO2 emission reduction by the proposed

bioenergy routes is some 10 times that of other low cost

measures


5 Conclusions

An efficient and sustainable strategy for the exploitation of

biomass resources for energy use needs a complex analysis

based on a multi-disciplinary approach This paper describes

a procedure to analyse an energy cropping system which

takes in account both economic and environmental aspects

and applies it to the case study of Puglia Region A multi-

criteria GIS-based methodology is also proposed and applied

to Puglia region to evaluate the potentials of energy crops and

most suitable areas for their cultivation

The case studies of annual oleagineous (brassica carinata)

and herbaceous (fibre sorghum) energy crops are imple-

mented The proposed biomass treatment and energy

conversion routes are based respectively on an oil mill plant to

produce bio-oil for CHP by diesel ICE and on a pelleting plant to

produce a pellet to be mixed with the oil cake pellet produced

in the previous route in order to fed a gasifier coupled to

a syngas engine In both cases the CHP plants have size of

1 MWe in order to be eligible for the feed-in tariff of 300 V

MWh1 for electricity produced by small scale power plant

fired by lsquolsquolocalrsquorsquo biomass and fed into the grid The energy

potentials results show that the northern area of the region

(Foggia) is the most suitable for energy crops with a theoretical

potential of about 25 bio-oil fired power plants and 81 pellet

fired power plants The overall potentials in Puglia result

respectively of 48 bio-oil fired and 124 pellet fired power plants

The results of the financial assessment show that with the

current Italian support mechanism the bio-oil route presents

the highest profitability (IRR of 38) in comparison to the pellet

gasification route (IRR of 17) but it is more sensitive to vari-

ations in feed-in tariff value net electrical efficiency of the

plant and biomas purchase price Moreover the maximum

biomass remuneration in the case of bio-oil is below its actual

market price (for food animal feeding or other use) showing

that the energy conversion is not a profitable option for the

farmer with the current biomass market prices On the

contrary the maximum biomass remuneration in the case of

pellet gasification route is very interesting and determines

a maximum income for the farmer which is very competitive

with that commonly achieved by traditional crops for the

selected lands Despite this the small scale gasification tech-

nology is still at a demonstration stage and even if very

promising presents low reliability and uncertainties in the

efficiencies which could be achieved The results of the energy

saved and CO2 emissions avoided by the two routes report that

about 36ndash38 of the energyCO2 saved is consumedproduced

during the whole bioenergy route Finally the cost for the

community required per TOE of primary energy saved and

tCO2 avoided results some 10 times higher that one of other

lower cost measures to achieve the same results so proving

that these bioenergy routes are not the most profitable way to

achieve energy saving or CO2 emissions reductions

r e f e r e n c e s

AEEG (Autorita per lrsquoenergia elettrica e il gas) (2008) Web site ofthe italian electricity authority wwwautoritaenergiait

Allen J Browne M Hunter A Boyd J Palmer H (1998) Logisticsmanagement and costs of biomass fuel supply Int J PhysDistrib Logistics Management 28 463ndash477

ARSIA (2004) Energy crops the bioenergy farm project (Le colturededicate ad uso energetico il progetto Bioenergy Farm)Quaderno ARSIA 62004 (in italian)

Audsley E (1997) Harmonisation of environmental life cycleassessment Final Report Concerted action AIR3-CT94-2028European Commission DG VI Agriculture

Baldoni R Giardini L (1993) Coltivazioni erbacee Patron EditoreBologna Italy (in italian)

Basu P (2006) Combustion and Gasification in Fluidized Bed CRCPress Boca Raton FL pp 59ndash101

Bona S Mosca G Vamerali T (1999) Oil crops for biodieselproduction in Italy Renewable Energy 16 1053ndash1056

Bouaid A Diaz Y Martinez M Aracil J (2005) Pilot plant studies ofbiodiesel production using Brassica carinata as raw materialCatalyses Today 106 193ndash196

Bridgwater A V (1995) The technical and economic feasibility ofbiomass gasification for power generation Fuel 74(5)631ndash653

Bridgwater A V Toft A J Brammer J G (2002) A techno-economiccomparison of power production by biomass fast pyrolysiswith gasification and combustion Renewable and SustainableEnergy Reviews 6 181ndash248

Caliandro A Lamaddalena N Stelluti M Seduto P (2005) Agro-ecologic characterization of Puglia region (Caratterizzazioneagroecologica della Regione Puglia in funzione dellapotenzialita produttiva) Progetto Acla 2 Opuscolo Divulgativo(in italian)

Caputo A C Palumbo M Pelagagge P M Scacchia F (2005)Economics of biomass energy utilization in combustion andgasification plants effects of logistic variables Biomass andBioenergy 28 35ndash51

Cardone M Mazzoncini M Menini S Rocco V Senatore AVitolo S (2003) Brassica carinata as an alternative oil crop forthe production of biodiesel in Italy agronomic evaluation fuelproduction by transesterification and characterizationBiomass and Bioenergy 25(6) 623ndash636

Ciaschini F De Carolis C Toscano G (2005) Techno-economicissues of mechanical sunflower oil seeds extraction for energypurposes [(Aspetti tecnici ed economici dellrsquoestrazionemeccanica dellrsquoolio di girasole a scopi energetici)] Proceedingsof VIII Italian Conference of Agricultural EngineeringlsquolsquoLrsquoingegneria agraria per lo sviluppo sostenibile nellrsquoareamediterranearsquorsquo Catania Italy 27ndash30 june (in italian)

CBT (Centre for Biomass Technology) (1998) Straw for energyproduction Second ed p 53

CGIAR (2004) SRTM 90m Digital Elevation Data Version 3Available from httpsrtmcsicgiarorg

CTI (2004) Techno-economic assessment of a wood pelletproduction route [(Progetto PROBIO Analisi tecnico-economica di una filiera per la produzione di pellet di legno)]in italian Available from httpwwwcti2000it (accessed onApril 2008)

Dornburg V Faaij A (2001) Efficiency and economy of woodfiredbiomass energy systems in relation to scale regarding heatand power generation using combustion and gasificationtechnologies Biomass and Bioenergy 21 91ndash108

EGN (European Gasification Network) (2008) EGN web sitehttpwwwgasnetuknet (access on May 2008)

European Commission (2005) Communication from thecommission Biomass action plan SEC(2005) 1573

European Commission (2006) Communication from thecommission An EU Strategy for Biofuels SEC(2006) 142

FAO (1976) Framework for land evaluation Soils Bulletin 32Ferchau E (2000) Equipment for Decentralised Cold Pressing of Oil

Seeds Folkecenter for Renewable Energy


Frischknecht R Jungbluth N (2004) Ecoinvent project SwissCentre for Life Cycle Inentories Du bendorf SwitzerlandAvailable from httpwwwecoinventchS (access on March2008)

Gasol C M Gabarrell X Anton A Rigola M Carrasco J Ciria PSolano M L Rieradevall J (2007) Life cycle assessment ofa Brassica carinata bioenergy cropping system in southernEurope Biomass and Bioenergy 31 543ndash555

Hallam A Anderson I C Buxton D R (2001) Comparativeeconomic analysis of perennial annual and intercrops forbiomass production Biomass and Bioenergy 21 407ndash412

Higman C Van der Burgt M (2003) Gasification ElsevierBurlington MA

Kallivroussis L Natsis A Papadakis G (2002) The Energy Balanceof Sunflower Production for Biodiesel in Greece BiosystemsEngineering 81(3) 347ndash354

King J E (1999) Pelletized switchgrass for space and waterheating Task 2 final report by Coriolis Ltd Lawrence Kansassubmitted to the KCC Grant No DE-FG48ndashFG97R802102

Kirubakaran V Sivaramakrishnan V Nalini R Sekar TPremalatha M Subramanian P A review on gasification ofbiomass Renew Sustain Energy Review in press doi 101016jrser200707001

Knoef H A M (2005) Handbook of biomass gasification BiomassTechnology Group

Krishnan P Nagarajan S Mohai A V (2004) ThermodynamicCharacterisation of Seed Deterioration during Storage underAccelerated Ageing Conditions Biosystems Engineering 89(4)425ndash433

IEA (International Energy Agency) (2008) Task 33 Thermalgasification of biomass Available from httpwwwgastechnologyorgiea (accessed on April 2008)

Italian Parliament (2007a) Law n 244 24 december 2007Available from httpwwwparlamentoitleggi07244lhtm(access on September 2008)

Italian Parliament (2007b) Italian Law n 222 29 november 2007Available from httpwwwparlamentoitleggi07222lhtm(access on September 2008)

Jannasch R Quan Y Samson R A (2001) Process and energy analysisof pelletizing switchgrass Final report Available from httpwww reapcanadacomonline_libraryReports and NewslettersBioenergy11A Processpdf (acces on march 2008)

Mazzoncini M Santonoceto C Croce L Giuffre A M (1999)Agronomic performance and seed quality of Brassica napus Bcarinata and B juncea different lines grown in southern Italyenvironmental conditions Proceedings of the 10thInternational Rapeseed Congress 26ndash29 September CanberraAustralia 1999

Moncada P L P Grassi G (1993) Bio-energy and the environmentMIT Energy Laboratory Working Paper 1ndash18

Monti A Venturi G (2003) Comparison of the energy performanceof fibre sorghum sweet sorghum and wheat monocultures inNorthern Italy European Journal of Agronomy 19 35ndash43

Monti A Fazio S Lychnarasb V Soldatos P Venturi G (2006)A full economic analysis of switchgrass under differentscenarios in Italy estimated by BEE model Biomass andBioenergy 31(4) 177ndash185

Nemecek T Heil A Huguenin O Meier S Erzinger S Blaser SDux D Zimmermann A (2004) Life cycle inventories ofagricultural production systems Final Report Ecoinvent 2000No 15 Agroscope FAL Reckenholz and FAT Taenikon SwissCentre for Life Cycle Inventories Du bendorf Available fromwwwecoinventchS

Novem (Netherland agency for energy and the environment)(1996) Pretreatment technologies for energy crops BTGBiomass Technology Group BV Enschede

OPET (Organization for the Promotion of Energy Technologies)(2002) Wood pellets in Finland ndash Technology economy and

markets Available from httpwwwtekesfiOPETpdfOPET_report5_june2002pdf (access on April 2008)

Panoutsou C Namatov I Lychnaras V Nikolaou A (2007)Biodiesel options in Greece Biomass and Bioenergy 32(6)473ndash481

Pantaleo A Jablonski S Panoutsou C Bauen A (2007a)Assessment of the potential bioenergy demand for electricityand CHP the case of the UK 15th European BiomassConference and Exibition from research to marketdeployment Berlin 7-11 May ISBN 978-88-89407-59-X pp2477ndash2491

Pantaleo A Pellerano A Tiravanti G Bauen A (2007b) lsquolsquoSmallscale bioenergy CHP technologies in the UK and Italianmarketrsquorsquo 15th European Biomass Conference and Exibitionfrom research to market deployment Berlin 7ndash11 May ISBN978-88-89407-59-X

Pantaleo A Pellerano A Tiravanti G (2007c) Pellets productionroutes overview and techno-economic study in SouthernItaly 15th European Biomass Conference and Exibition fromresearch to market deployment Berlin 7ndash11 May ISBN 978-88-89407-59-X

Pellerano A Pantaleo A Tenerelli P Carone M T (2007) Study forenergy valorization of agro-forestry biomass in Puglia region[(Studio per la valorizzazione energetica di biomasseagroforestali nella Regione Puglia)] pp 207 PROGESADepartment University of Bari available from wwwprogesaunibait (in italian)

Peters M S Timmerhaus K D (1991) Plant Design And Economicsfor Chemical Engineers (fouth ed) McGraw-Hill New York

Pre Consultants (2008) Available from wwwprenlsimapro(access on March 2008)

Purohit P Tripathi A K Kandpal T C (2006) Energetics of coalsubstitution by briquettes of agricultural residues Energy 311321ndash1331

Rentizelas A A Tolis A J Tatsiopoulos I P Rentizelas A A et al24 Logistics issues of biomass The storage problem and themulti-biomass supply chain Renewable and SustainableEnergy Review in press doi 101016jrser200801003

Riva G Foppa Pedretti E Toscano G Scrosta V Cerioni RCiaschini F Duca D (2006) Sunflower to energy chains resultsof the research project PROBIO (PROBIO-filiere biocombustibilida girasole sintesi dei risultati della ricerca contottanellrsquoambito del progetto interregionale) ASSAM ISBN 88-8249-099-8 (in italian)

Samson P Duxbury P Drisdelle M Lapointe C (2000) Assessment ofpelletized biofuels Reap-canada and Dell-Point Bioenergyresearch Available from httpwwwreap-canadacomonline_libraryReports20and20NewslettersBioenergy1520Assessment20ofPDF (access on September 2008-09-25)

Sanderson M A Reed M L McLaughlin S B Wullschleger S DConger B V Parrish D J Wolf D D Tagliaferro C Hopkins AOcumpaugh W R Hussey M A Read J C Tischler C R (1996)Switchgrass as a sustainable energy crop BioresourceTechnology 56 83ndash93

Smith G A Buxton R (1993) Temperate zone sweet sorghum ethanolproduction potential Bioresource Technology 43(1) 71ndash75

Toscano G Foppa Pedretti E Valdes P H (2005) Techno-economicvalorization of wood pruning by pelletization routes[(Valorizazione tecnico-economica del legno di potaturamediante pellettizzazione)] Proceedings of NationalConference of Agriculture and Engineering Catania 27ndash30June (in italian)

Toscano G Foppa Pedretti E (2007) Evaluation of a mathematicalmodel for oil extraction from oleagineous seeds Rivista diIngegneria Agraria 38(2) 11ndash20

Van der Drift A Van Doorn J Vermeulen J W (2001) Ten residualbiomass fuels for circulating fluidized-bed gasificationBiomass and Bioenergy 20 45ndash56


Venturi P Fernandez J Marquez L (1997) Energy costs for biomasscrops [(Costi energetici per le colture da biomassa)] Proceedingsof the VI National Conference of Agriculture and EngineeringAncona Italy September 10ndash12 pp 35ndash46 (in italian)

Venturi P Venturi G (2003) Analysis of energy comparison forcrops in European agricultural systems Biomass andBioenergy 25 235ndash255

Volvo Truck Corporation (2003) Emission from Volvorsquos TruckEmissionsstandarddiesel fuel Available fromwwwvolvocompeNRrdonlyresEF65E6D8-BF98-4BBF-B539-18C925B538440Emis_eng_20640_03017pdf (access on March 2008-09-25)

Wang L Weller CL Jones DD Hanna MA Contemporary issues inthermal gasification of biomass and its application toelectricity and fuel Biomass and Bioenergy in pressdoi101016jbiombioe200712007

Worley J W Cundiff J S Vaughan D H (1992a) Potential economicreturn from fiber residues produced as by-products of juiceexpression from sweet sorghum Bioresource Technology41(2) 153ndash159

Worley J W Vaughan D H Cundiff J S (1992b) Energy analysis ofethanol production from sweet sorghum BioresourceTechnology 40(3) 263ndash273


supply at minimum price and agricultural operators who

aim to maximize their revenues trading their products on

the basis of market opportunities and avoiding long term

biomass supply contracts (iv) legislative issues and in

particular the reliability and effectiveness of incentives and

support schemes and the complex permit procedures to

build bioenergy power plants (v) social issues namely public

acceptance A comprehensive overview of these aspects is

provided by Pantaleo et al (2007a)

The aim of this work is to address some of those chal-

lenges in an integrated approach for land planning

economic analysis and environmental impact assessment in

view of the Italian subsidy framework (Italian Parliament

2007a Italian Parliament 2007b) in force since January 2008

which offers particularly favourable subsidies to small scale

CHP plants (up to 1 MWe) fired by lsquolsquolocalrsquorsquo biomass (ie

produced within a collection basin radius up to 70 km from

the conversion plant)

The energy crops potential assessment proposed in this

paper is based on a previous work of the authors (Peller-

ano et al 2007) which was applied to Puglia region in

order to select the most promising energy crops and to

estimate the energy potential in different penetration

scenarios In this paper on the basis of these potentials

two possible small-scale energy crops to CHP routes are

assessed taking into account technical economic and

environmental issues The main results are the number of

CHP plants which could be installed in the region and the

maximum biomass remuneration from energy conversion

under different techno-economic scenarios Finally the

energy and CO2 emissions balance of the whole biomass to

energy routes is assessed in order to calculate the cost for

the community to save a tons oil equivalent (TOE) of

primary energy and to avoid a tCO2 emission when

implementing the proposed routes

The procedure is applied to the Puglia region (Southern

Italy) an area of 19500 km2 with a high percentage of agri-

cultural land (about 70 of the total area) and a Mediterranean

semi-arid climate The case studies of annual oleagineous

(brassica carinata) and herbaceous (fibre sorghum) energy

crops are implemented The proposed biomass treatment and

energy conversion routes are based respectively on an oil

mill plant to produce bio-oil for CHP by diesel internal

combustion engines (ICE) and on a pelleting plant to produce

a pellet to be mixed with the oil cake pellet produced in the

previous route in order to feed a gasifier coupled to a syngas

engine

- Energy crops selection- Potentials assessment

Energy conversion routes selection

Biomass supply

CHP plants nuMax biomass rem

Techno-economic plant parameters

Fig 1 ndash General flowchart of the procedure t

2 Methodology

The general procedure flowchart is shown in Fig 1 and each

step is commented in the following


The most promising energy crops for the territory are selected

according to their ecological requirements A preliminary

database is thus created to collect all the energy crops

parameters and to select those species whose characteristics

match the regionrsquos pedoclimatic condition The steps of the

land suitability assessment are discussed elsewhere (FAO

1976 Pellerano et al 2007) In particular the first step consists

of the identification of the available land for conversion to

energy crops according to economic and environmental

impact criteria The adopted factors are the slope and the

actual land use type These data layers are used as Boolean

factors (yesno) to select only those areas with the required

slope and land use type On the basis of the ecological

requirement of each energy crop the following land charac-

teristic are collected (i) the mean monthly precipitation (ii)

the soil drainage (iii) the soil depth (iv) the soil texture (v) the

soil pH and (vi) the presence of carbonates The cartographic

data (pedologic map and climate map) are processed in order

to obtain one single data layer for each land characteristic All

the dataset are projected in the UTM WGS84 (zone 33)

projection system and transformed to raster data with a pixel

of 100 m applying the lsquolsquoNEAREST neighbourrsquorsquo algorithm Each

cell therefore represents a homogeneous unit with its quan-

titative land characteristic Having obtained a homogeneous

dataset each data layer is reclassified by coupling to each

energy crop and each land characteristic a land index (ranging

from 0 to 100) which is representative of the compatibility of

the land characteristic with the ecological requirement of the

crop Finally for each energy crop and each cell a composite

suitability score is obtained by means of the following

weighted linear combination of land indices

Fik frac14Xn

jfrac141

wjkFijk 0 wj 1 (1)

being

Fik the composite suitability score for the i-th cell and the k-th

crop

costs

mber uneration

Subsidies

Cost for the Community for TOE and tCO2 saved

- Energy balance- CO2 balance

Revenues from energy

o analyse the energy cropping systems



the k-th crop



methodology)



shown in Table 1



niques selected






























































3 Application














































































machines







































































Fibre sorghum










S 90 nd nd

SL 90

Brassica carinata








WD 90 LS 70 81ndash85 30


S 60

SL 70



bio

sy

st

em

se

ng

in

ee

rin

g1

02

(2

00

9)

34

5ndash

35

93

49


Fibre sorghum





Water 180 V ha1



Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1














and Mailca Srl)













































(CBT 1998)















































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s







































































the k-th crop



methodology)



shown in Table 1



niques selected






























































3 Application














































































machines







































































Fibre sorghum










S 90 nd nd

SL 90

Brassica carinata








WD 90 LS 70 81ndash85 30


S 60

SL 70



bio

sy

st

em

se

ng

in

ee

rin

g1

02

(2

00

9)

34

5ndash

35

93

49


Fibre sorghum





Water 180 V ha1



Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1














and Mailca Srl)













































(CBT 1998)















































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s



















































































































machines







































































Fibre sorghum










S 90 nd nd

SL 90

Brassica carinata








WD 90 LS 70 81ndash85 30


S 60

SL 70



bio

sy

st

em

se

ng

in

ee

rin

g1

02

(2

00

9)

34

5ndash

35

93

49


Fibre sorghum





Water 180 V ha1



Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1














and Mailca Srl)













































(CBT 1998)















































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s






































































Fibre sorghum










S 90 nd nd

SL 90

Brassica carinata








WD 90 LS 70 81ndash85 30


S 60

SL 70



bio

sy

st

em

se

ng

in

ee

rin

g1

02

(2

00

9)

34

5ndash

35

93

49


Fibre sorghum





Water 180 V ha1



Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1














and Mailca Srl)













































(CBT 1998)















































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s






































































Fibre sorghum





Water 180 V ha1



Brassica carinata



Harvesting 85 V ha1














and Mailca Srl)













































(CBT 1998)















































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s







































































Pelletgasification





mix y1

Crop land needed to

feed the plant

3043 ha y1 363 ha y1






Bio-oilextraction

Pelletproduction

Biomass production

cost

























by sorghum












V MWh1

(2)



expression

C frac14 Ir


(3)



Pelletproduction









percentage 20









appraisal












Operation amp

maintenance cost

170 kV 263 kV






pellet)1


























ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s






















































































ation over 15 years



appraisal


































































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s



















































































Plantnumber

Brassica carinata

Foggia 168122 141072 77296 154592 25

Bari 100832 28605 32359 64718 11

Brindisi 35812 512 9083 18166 3

Taranto 48833 14495 15832 31664 5

Lecce 40199 8533 12183 24366 4

Total 393788 193226 146754 293506 48

Fiber sorghum

Foggia 2685 125296 31995 479929 81

Bari 0 61389 15347 230209 39

Brindisi 0 0 0 0 0

Taranto 0 4933 1233 18499 3

Lecce 0 0 0 0 0

Total 2685 191671 48576 728835 124




















Pelletgasification

PBT (year) 3 62

IRR () 38 17

PI (pu) 342 173

NPV (kV) 2730 2555



(t biomass)1


biomass cost

123 246

Max biomass income

for the farmer

133 Vt ha1 1240 Vt ha1


























the grid





















20 20 20 20










100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s





































































100110120130140150160170180190200210220230240250

57 65 73 81 89 97 105

Pellet co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1







60 V tL1)

























prices















route respectively

20030040050060070080090010001100120013001400

203 232 261 291 320 349 378

Bio

-o

il co

st at C

HP

p

lan

t

t-1























200300400500600700800900100011001200130014001500


-1

Bio

-o

il rem

un

eratio

n

t-1






0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s





































































0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500


-1

Pe

lle

t m

ix

re

mu

ne

ra

tio

n

t-1





22)












Bio-oilICE

Pelletgasification





Treatment 67 88 182 256












Treatment 148 75 433 242

Conversion 211 106 285 159







































Venturi 2003)











biomass drying
















measures


5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s






































































5 Conclusions




















































r e f e r e n c e s





































































Potentials and feasibility assessment of small scale CHP plants fired by energy crops in Puglia...

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Transcript of Potentials and feasibility assessment of small scale CHP plants fired by energy crops in Puglia...