[Bioconversion] Usefulness R&D

[Gerald Comeau]

to Bioconversion llist from Gerald Comeau
   
  Ref Lewis L. Smith's posting
   
  As someone who is actively promoting projects in collaboration with a well recognized US univerisity in the field of combution and energy studies, I found Lewis Smith's feasibility approach uselful . He has pointed out that he is leery of generalizations such as those found in the Roger Samson posting.  I am entierely in his support in this sentiment.
   
  Roger Samson has pointed out in an earlier posting that biomass must be treated differently from the large scale found in the refining of fossil fuels.  He should not assume that those engineers and scientists with backgrounds in the petrochemical industry who are now committed to bomass utilization, are blind to the dispersed nature of biomass.  I believe the prevailing idea by those dedicated scientists involves the adaptation to viable scales of operations for particular situtaions of feedstock supply as they arise in the field. 
   
  In my promotion of new projects involving biomass feedstocks for processes yielding high value second generation energy carriers such as dimethyl ether, I have frequently found natural scientists uncooperative.  I have found an unwillingness on the part of many of them to look beyond furnaces for space heating and  making steam for electric power.  
   
  I can only guess at the reasons for a reactionary attitiude on the part of many scientists to emerging new technologies, however in some instances these attitudes may be be very detrimental to new oportunities in the development of a renewable energy economy from biomass.
   
  Those scientists serving the forestry and agricultural sectors, frequently have large networks of contacts at their disposal, and they spend a great deal of their time promoting their agenda at ongoing organized publicly sponsored acitivities such as workshops, focus group meetings, etc, etc, etc.  They have contacts in institutions including: universities scientists;  federal, state (provincial), and municipal government officials;  executives from natural resources industries; and many others.  They frequently use their wideflung networks to act as spokespersons for establishing government policy for economic development.  This may work out well for maintaining their own research budgets.  Unfolrtunalely these same attitiudes may have negative consequences as well.  They may exert negative influences in areas of viable technologies, and unfortunately promising projects involving sophisticated technologies for the development of second generation energy carriers from biomass
 feedstocks.  The result is that potentially viable projects are killed before they can see the light of day.
   
  I urge natural scientists operating in the fields of agriculture and forestry to refrain from taking a broad brush approach to R&D when it involves sophisticated technologies for  biomass utilization for conversion to energy, unless those same natural scientists are qualified to participate in the evaluation of the individual projects on which they are asked for an assessment.  
   
  There are competent and capable specialized engineers and scientists who have a background in fossil fuel exploration or petroleum refining, actively pursuing new careers in the field of renewable energy from biomass.  I know several.  These engineers and scientists can bring important knowledge in the field of biomass utilization as feedstocks for energy conversion processes and should be given a fair chance.  
   
  Best Regards,
   
  Gerald Comeau
   
  somewhere near the woodlands of New Brunswick, Canada, who can be contacted at geraldcomeau at yahoo.com 
   
   
   
   
  
MMBTUPR at aol.com wrote:
  to Bioconversion List from Lewis L Smith

Ref Roger Samson's latest posting.

Roger may be right, but as an energy economist who has done a lot of project 
evaluations ["feasibility studies"] I am leery of such generalizations. The 
attractiveness of many options in the biomass-energy field is often highly site 
sensitive. 

For example, pelletizing for co-firing with coal may justify both the 
pelletizing and a fairly long haul to the boiler. Pelletizing for decentralized 
["distributed"] gasification is probably too expensive, in terms of the 
incremental improvement in the combustion properties of the feedstock. Again this will 
depend on what is in the soil and how much of the noxious materials are picked 
up by the plant in growing and in harvesting respectively. In this engineers 
should remember that the field and transport aspects of biomass energy never 
have been, are not now and never will be "in the six sigma" world.

Ethanol is often a coproduct of processes where important costs are both 
joint and variable. In such cases, the economic feasibility of the process depends 
on all coproduct prices and volumes, not just on those for ethanol. Under 
such conditions, ethanol cannot be considered in isolation, no matter how 
sophisticated the cost-allocation techniques which the accountants come up with. 
Such techniques may be fine for preparing tax returns, valuing inventories and 
valuing "in house" consumption of output, but they are no good for doing the 
economics of such a project. [If anyone wants a paper on the subject, post me 
a "snail mail" address.]

And so on.

Perhaps some graduate student somewhere could be persuaded to compile a list 
of operating projects, whether commercial scale or not, along with estimates 
of their life-cycle costs. There is a lot of evidence out there but at the 
level of the Internet, most of it is anecdotal and/or widely scattered.

One generalization that may prove useful is to give priority to feedstocks 
which do not get us into horrendous food-vs-fuel arguments, such as those which 
helped to kill "energy cane" in Puerto Rico and which are now entangling the 
use of soy beans for energy in the US Midwest. 

Cordially. End of message.
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