Because our brains are controlled by history and habit we tend to think about things the way wethought about them yesterday.
It means we're missing the opportunity for bioenergy says Brian Cox.
The Executive Officer of the BioenergyAssociation of New Zealand is passionate about how we could use what now is simply wasted, aswell as bits of surplus land which can be used to grow sources of energy in different forms.
It should be noted that Cox is no green-tinged, environmentally and economically unrealisticairhead. Wearing his other daytime hat, he's the director of
In the first instance Cox is talking about forestry waste, in the second the ability to growshort rotation energy crops such as
Miscanthus
(a kind of tall grass to you and me).
To this end, the Association's produced a remarkably readable
'Economic growth and employment built on New Zealand's capability and expertise in forestry, woodprocessing and bioenergy production - leading to new business opportunities which by 2040 supplymore than 25% of the country's energy needs, including 30% of the country's transport fuels.'
But let's back up a step or two.
The first thing we need to do is change our way of thinking (a paradigm shift even!).
Take the quantity of forestry production that doesn't produce a log - commonly 20% of thetotal.
Viewed as a broader biomass resource and understanding its science, under differentpressures and temperatures it can be utilised for its solid, liquid or gas components (and sometimesa combination of them).
As wood chips, or reformed into wood pellets (which also utilises sawdust), there's opportunitiesto burn them directly for heat. Cox envisages wood chips or pellets replacing coal in furnaces(already happening in a number of ‘informed’ locations throughout the country).
The same chips or pellets can also be heated in a gasifier (retrofitted to an existing gasboiler) and their heat potential used in this way.
Looking at the extraction of lignin and zylose in addition to logs and lumber makes pine treesextremely valuable. The resulting cellulose residues can then be converted to ethanol or biodiesel -and their application here is something that really needs thinking about says Cox.
As a transport fuel, using what is now wasted, producing 30% of the country's transport fuel is aquite an achievable target (in fact it is well under what is possible but Cox is careful not tooverhype its potential).
Throwing in short rotation, annually harvested crops such as Miscanthus, or coppicing trees suchas willows, (salix) or eucalyptus, and the ability for New Zealand to sustainably produce a fairpercentage of its transport fuels becomes really eye-opening he says.
The commercialisation and use of lignocellulose from wood or grasses to produce biodiesel isrealistically still 10-15 years away Cox says, "but we know we can do it as a number of plants arenow being built around the world." One huge advantage of this advanced biodiesel is that it isexactly the same molecular structure as mineral diesel.
However he is adamant that using long rotation forestry waste as well as short rotation cropswill be necessary to make such biofuel quantities an achievable target.
"In the meantime we should be consolidating what we do now," says Cox.
The cost of manufacturing biodiesel from tallow and cooking oils by esterfication is not too faraway from the cost of mineral diesel.
"For biodiesel, we already have demand outstripping supply, as we've approached a capacity issueand investment in additional plant is now necessary."
Added to this is that the grants available under the government’s Biodiesel Grants Scheme(which bridge the gap between the cost of production and market price) stop in 2012. "All that we'vegained so far could be lost, we'll be back to square one," he says. "At about 180 cents a litre, wemay not need the grants, but we're still pushing the government not to have a stop/go approach as wetransition to that price threshold. At the rate that the price of mineral diesel is ramping up thatthreshold is likely to be reached within the next three years."
Cox says that Auckland company Ecodiesel has a three-quarters built plant to make biodiesel fromtallow, but this is mothballed as investors need the confidence of the grants being available beyond2012. Commissioning that plant could allow current unsatisfied demand to be met and so assistconsolidate vehicle owners experience of using biodiesel ahead of the production of significantvolumes of advanced biofuels from wood and grasses in the coming years. .
As somewhat of an evangelist for biofuels, Cox says there are individual and country benefitsthat can be gained from and investing in plant to use to use forestry waste, as well as specialistshort rotation crops to produce direct heat and transport fuels, as well as valuable liquid and gasbiochemical products.
"But let's start doing it now," he says.
"Beginning the process in 10 or 15 years will be too late, and a total waste of a resource thatwe currently, literally, throw away."