Use of bioenergy can contribute to greenhouse gas emission reductions and increased energy security. However, even though biomass is a renewable resource, the potential is limited, and efficient use of available biomass resources will become increasingly important. This paper aims to explore system interactions related to future bioenergy utilization and cost-efficient bioenergy technology choices under stringent CO2 constraints. In particular, the study investigates system effects linked to integration of advanced biofuel production with district heating and industry under different developments in the electricity sector and biomass supply system. The study is based on analysis with the MARKAL_Sweden model, which is a bottom-up, cost-optimization model covering the Swedish energy system. A time horizon to 2050 is applied. The results suggest that system integration of biofuel production has noteworthy effects on the overall system level, improves system cost-efficiency and influences parameters such as biomass price, marginal CO2 emission reduction costs and cost-efficient biofuel choices in the transport sector. In the long run and under stringent CO2 constraints, system integration of biofuel production has, however, low impact on total bioenergy use, which is largely decided by supply-related constraints, and on total transport biofuel use, which to large extent is driven by demand.
The required level of a sector specific CO2e-cost in the transport sector to make the net annual profit (NAP) of three different gasification based biofuel production systems positive (systems profitable) is investigated. The analysis is made for two different energy market scenarios for 2030 and 2040. The results show that the additional required sector specific CO2e-cost (additional to a sector wide general cost) is not higher than the current level of CO2e-tax in Sweden. The required total level of CO2e-cost for the transport sector is in the 450 ppmv scenario in general higher than the current CO2-tax level but not higher than the fuel tax level (including also energy tax).The study also compares the NAP and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction potential of the gasification-based systems to a system where the biomass is used in conventional bio-CHP to produce heat and power and where the power is used in the transport sector (in battery electric vehicles (BEV)). Under the investigated energy market scenarios the bio-CHP and BEV system has higher NAP and higher GHG emission reduction potential. However, the bio-CHP system has a stronger dependency on the availability of large heat sinks and profits from a high price of delivered heat.
The impact of different integration options for gasification-based biofuel production systems producing synthetic natural gas, methanol and FT (Fischer-Tropsch) fuels on the NAP (net annual profit), FPC (fuel production cost) and the GHG (greenhouse gas) emission reduction potential are analysed. The considered integration options are heat deliveries to DH (district heating) systems or to nearby industries and integration with infrastructure for CO2 storage. The comparison is made to stand-alone configurations in which the excess heat is used for power production. The analysis considers future energy market scenarios and case studies in southwestern Sweden. The results show that integration with DH systems has small impacts on the NAP and the FPC and diverging (positive or negative) impacts on the GHG emissions. Integration with industries has positive effects on the economic and GHG performances in all scenarios. The FPCs are reduced by 7–8 percent in the methanol case and by 12–13 percent in the FT production case. The GHG emission reductions are strongly dependent on the reference power production. The storage of separated CO2 shows an increase in the GHG emission reduction potential of 70–100 percent for all systems, whereas the impacts on the economic performances are strongly dependent on the CO2e-charge.
Excess heat could meet approximately 25% of the heat demand in the European building sector. However, the recovery of excess heat is low, which has been attributed to financial, technical and organisational barriers. There is limited information on the perceived risk exposure of excess heat recovery at different points in time, before undertaking the investment or after having undertaken the investment, and at locations with existing district heating networks or not (greenfield). This is unfortunate because experience can enable new collaborations. In this paper, we compare the perceived risk exposure of four greenfield and two ongoing industrial excess heat recovery collaborations.
In doing so, we confirm previously identified barriers, such as difficulty to agree on the value of excess heat, the risk of a single heat source and lack of regulation. We also find that, with experience, changes to the excess heat-generating processes are increasingly important, whereas, greenfield sites find the lack of ‘know-how’ to be risky. However, the main conclusion from this paper is that the risks of industrial excess heat recovery collaborations appear to be over-emphasised. In fact, risk exposure of industrial activity can be reduced through industrial waste heat recovery as excess heat is characterized by limited price fluctuations and new environmental requirements from customers and authorities can be met proactively. Combining experience with a standardised excess heat recovery policy should significantly reduce the risk exposure of new collaborations.