Biomass what is the cost

Home Costs Charts Biomass. Biomass Summary Charts. Biomass pellet prices for large-scale consumers in Austria. Evolution of the price of sugarcane and bagasse in India Global cumulative installed capacity LCOE cost ranges and weighted averages of biomass-fired electricity.

LCOE from renewable power generation technologies for pacific islands. Levelised electricity cost ranges and weighted averages of biomass-fired. Project capacity factors and weighted averages of biomass-fired. Project capacity factors and weighted averages of biomass-fired electric. Share of fuel costs in the LCOE of bioenergy power generation. A less labor-intensive option is to use automated stackers to build the piles and reclaimers to move chips from the piles to the chip bunker or silo.

Wood chip-fired electric power systems typically use one dry ton per megawatt-hour of electricity production. This approximation is typical of wet wood systems and is useful for a first approximation of fuel use and storage requirements but the actual value will vary with system efficiency.

This water will reduce the recoverable energy content of the material, and reduce the efficiency of the boiler, as the water must be evaporated in the first stages of combustion. The biggest problems with biomass-fired plants are in handling and pre-processing the fuel. This is the case with both small grate-fired plants and large suspension-fired plants.

Drying the biomass before combusting or gasifying it improves the overall process efficiency, but may not be economically viable in many cases. Exhaust systems are used to vent combustion by-products to the environment. Emission controls might include a cyclone or multi-cyclone, a baghouse, or an electrostatic precipitator. The primary function of all of the equipment listed is particulate matter control, and is listed in order of increasing capital cost and effectiveness.

Cyclones and multi-cyclones can be used as pre-collectors to remove larger particles upstream of a baghouse fabric filter or electrostatic precipitator. In addition, emission controls for unburned hydrocarbons, oxides of nitrogen, and sulfur might be required, depending on fuel properties and local, state, and Federal regulations. In a direct combustion system, biomass is burned in a combustor or furnace to generate hot gas, which is fed into a boiler to generate steam, which is expanded through a steam turbine or steam engine to produce mechanical or electrical energy.

In a direct combustion system, processed biomass is the boiler fuel that produces steam to operate a steam turbine and generator to make electricity. There are numerous companies, primarily in Europe, that sell small-scale engines and combined heat and power systems that can run on biogas, natural gas, or propane. Some of these systems are available in the United States, with outputs from about 2 kilowatts kW , and approximately 20, British thermal units Btu per hour of heat, to several megawatts MW.

In the United States, direct combustion is the most common method of producing heat from biomass. The two principal types of chip-fired direct combustion systems are stationary- and traveling-grate combustors, otherwise known as fixed-bed stokers and atmospheric fluidized-bed combustors.

There are various configurations of fixed-bed systems, but the common characteristic is that fuel is delivered in some manner onto a grate where it reacts with oxygen in the air. This is an exothermic reaction that produces very hot gases and generates steam in the heat exchanger section of the boiler. In either a circulating fluidized-bed or bubbling fluidized-bed system, the biomass is burned in a hot bed of suspended, incombustible particles, such as sand.

Compared to grate combustors, fluidized-bed systems generally produce more complete carbon conversion, resulting in reduced emissions and improved system efficiency. In addition, fluidized-bed boilers can use a wider range of feedstocks.

Furthermore, fluidized-bed systems have a higher parasitic electric load than fixed-bed systems due to increased fan power requirements. Although less common, biomass gasification systems are similar to combustion systems, except that the quantity of air is limited, and thus produce a clean fuel gas with a usable heating value in contrast to combustion, in which the off gas does not have a usable heating value.

Clean fuel gas provides the ability to power many different kinds of gas-based prime movers, such as internal combustion engines, Stirling engines, thermo electric generators, solid oxide fuel cells, and micro-turbines. The efficiency of a direct combustion or biomass gasification system is influenced by a number of factors, including biomass moisture content, combustion air distribution and amounts excess air , operating temperature and pressure, and flue gas exhaust temperature.

The type of system best suited to a particular application depends on many factors, including availability and cost of each type of biomass e. Projects that can make use of both electricity production and thermal energy from biomass energy systems are often the most cost effective.

If a location has predictable access to year-round, affordable biomass resources, then some combination of biomass heat and electricity production may be a good option.

Transportation of fuel accounts for a significant amount of its cost, so resources should ideally be available from local sources. In addition, a facility will typically need to store biomass feedstocks on-site, so site access and storage are factors to consider.

As with any on-site electricity technology, the electricity generating system will need to be interconnected to the utility grid. The rules for interconnection may be different if the system is a combined heat and power system instead of only for electricity production. The ability to take advantage of net metering may also be crucial to system economics.

The major capital cost items for a biomass power system include the fuel storage and fuel handling equipment, the combustor, boiler, prime mover e. System cost intensity tends to decrease as the system size increases.

Large systems require significant amounts of material, which leads to increasing haul distances and material costs. Therefore, determining the optimal system size for a particular application is an iterative process. A variety of incentives exist for biomass power, but vary with Federal and state legislation policies.

The timing of incentive programs often allows less construction time than needed for biomass projects. Also, Federal agencies often cannot take direct advantage of financial incentives for renewable energy unless they use a different ownership structure. Of interest, the State of Massachusetts recently removed biomass-fired electricity from its Renewable Portfolio Standard, because state officials did not believe that biomass provided a clear reduction in greenhouse gases.

As such, biomass projects no longer qualify for renewable energy certificates that count toward Massachusetts renewable energy goals or funding. The LCOE of biomass-fired power plants range from 6 to 29 cents per kWh based on capital costs and feedstock costs. Where low-cost feedstocks are available and capital costs are modest, biomass can be a very competitive power generation option, according to the analysis, and where low-cost agricultural or forestry residues and wastes are available, biomass can often compete with conventional power sources.

Even where feedstocks are more expensive, the LCOE range for biomass is still more competitive than for diesel-fired generation, making biomass an ideal solution for off-grid or minigrid electricity supply. There are four major components that largely determine the LCOE for biomass-fired power generation technologies, according to Taylor: feedstock cost and quality, equipment cost and performance, the balance of project costs and the cost of capital.

Operations and maintenance OM costs can make a significant contribution to the levelized cost of electricity as well, accounting for 9 to 20 percent of the LCOE for biomass power plants.

Fixed OM costs typically range from 2 to 7 percent of installed costs per year for most biomass technologies, with variable OM costs of around one-half a cent per kW hour kWh. Landfill gas systems have much higher fixed OM costs, which can be 10 to 20 percent of initial capital costs per year. To bring down the cost of biomass power technologies over time, Taylor has some insight. On feedstock, Taylor says the use of agricultural or forestry residues at the site where they are processed often results in the lowest electricity costs, given the noted importance of feedstock costs relative to overall electricity generation costs from bioenergy.

Current data shows that the most competitive projects using these feedstocks produce electricity for as low as 6 cents per kWh. Technology and cost specifics aside, some countries are clearly trailblazing the renewable energy path, and there are a few stand-outs and up-and-comers.

Currently, Europe and North America account for around two-thirds of total installed renewable energy capacity, a result of a combination of supportive policies and low-cost feedstocks, notably agricultural and forestry residues, according to Taylor.