Name: Maryam Tariq

Roll No. BBA-20-044

Class/ Section: BBA Morning/ A

Submitted To: Mam Faiqa Ishtiaq

Topic: Renewable Energy Resources

(Biomass)
Table of Contents
What is Biomass? ......................................................................................................................................... 1
Why Biomass Is Renewable Energy Resource? .......................................................................................... 1
Why We Need Renewable Energy Resources?............................................................................................ 1
Types of Biomass .......................................................................................................................................... 2
Wood And Agricultural Biomass ............................................................................................................... 2
Solid Waste ............................................................................................................................................... 6
Landfill Gas…………………………………………………..…………………………………………………………….………………………3

Alcohol Fuels……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….3

Converting Biomass to Energy………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..2

Direct Combustion………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………3

Thermal Conversion……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………2

Chemical Conversion…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..2

Biological Conversion………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….2

Advantage and Disadvantages of Using Biomass As Renewable Energy Source………………………………….2

Advantages…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………2

Disadvantages…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….2
 What is Biomass?
Biomass is organic matter (mostly plants and animals) used as fuel to produce
heat or electricity. Examples are wood and wood residues, energy crops,
agricultural residues, and waste from industry, farms and households.

 Why biomass is a renewable energy resource?

Biomass fuels are a renewable resource because it’s inherent energy comes
from the sun, they can be replaced fairly and quickly (times ranging from one
growing season to perhaps one or two decades) without permanently
depleting Earth's natural resources. By comparison, fossil fuels such as coal,
petroleum, and natural gas require millions of years to be produced.

 Why we need renewable energy resources?

It is well known that developed nations consume more energy per capita than
developing or countries. In general, the higher the per-capita energy
consumption, the higher the living standard. However, the rapid worldwide
increase in the consumption of fossil fuels in the twenty first century to meet
energy demand, mostly by industrialized nations, suggests that the time is not
 too distant before depletion begins to adversely affect petroleum and natural
gas reserves, This is expected to result in increased usage of alternative
biomass energy resources. Moreover consumption of fossil fuel is the primary
cause of global climate change, it is affecting our environment.

 Types of Biomass:
There are number of matter used for biomass but for the ease they are divided
into 4 types which are following;

 Wood and Agricultural Biomass

Most biomass used today is home grown energy. Wood-logs, chips, bark, and
sawdust-accounts are almost 79 percent of biomass energy. But any organic
matter can produce biomass energy. Other biomass sources include
agricultural waste products like fruit pits and corn cobs.

 Solid Waste
This turns waste into a usable form of energy. A ton (2,000 pounds) of garbage
contains about as much heat energy, as pounds of coal. Power plants that burn
garbage for energy are called waste-to-energy plants. These plants generate
electricity as much as coal-fired plants do except that garbage-not coal-is the
fuel used to fire an industrial boiler. Making electricity from garbage costs
more than making it from coal and other energy sources. The main advantage
of burning solid waste is it reduces the amount of garbage dumped in landfills
by 60 to 90 percent, and reduces the cost of landfill disposal.

 Landfill Gas
A substance called methane gas is produced as the waste decays in landfills.
Landfills can collect the methane gas, purify it, and then use it as an energy
source. Methane, which is the same thing as natural gas, is a good energy
source. The city landfill in Florence, Alabama recovers 32 million cubic feet of
methane gas a day. The city purifies the gas and then pumps it into natural gas
pipelines.
  Alcohol Fuels
Wheat, corn, and other crops can be converted into a variety of liquid fuels
including ethanol and methanol. Today ethanol is a high cost fuel and its use
has become a controversial issue. It is estimated that a barrel of oil will have to
more than double in price before ethanol can compete with gasoline as a
transportation fuel. Because ethanol is expensive, and because car engines
must be modified to run on pure ethanol, ethanol is usually mixed with
gasoline to produce gasohol. (Cars can run on gasohol without adjustments.)
Gasohol does have some advantages over gasoline, higher octane rating than
gasoline (provides your car with more power), and it is cleaner-burning than
unleaded gasoline, with one-third less carbon monoxide emissions.

 Converting biomass to energy

Biomass is converted to energy through various processes, including:

 Direct combustion:
It is the most common method for converting biomass to useful energy. All
biomass can be burned directly for heating buildings and water, for industrial
process heat, and for generating electricity in steam turbines.

 Thermal Conversion:
There are three main thermal processes – combustion, gasification, and
pyrolysis – to convert the biomass into various energy products.

Combustion is well established and widely practiced with many examples of

dedicated plant and co-firing applications. At present, biomass co-firing in
modern coal power plants is the most cost-effective biomass use for power
generation. Due to feedstock availability issues, dedicated biomass plants for
combined heat and power (CHP) are typically of smaller size.

Gasification provides a competitive way to convert diverse, highly

distributed, and low-value lignocellulosic biomass to syngas for combined
 heat and power generation, synthesis of liquid fuels, and production of
hydrogen (H2). A number of gasifier configurations have been developed.
Biomass integrated gasification combined cycles (BIGCC) using black liquor
are already in use. Gasification can also coproduce liquid fuels, and such
advanced technologies are currently being investigated in research and pilot
plants.

Pyrolysis is thermal destruction of biomass in the absence of air/oxygen to

produce liquid bio-oil, syngas, and charcoal. Fast pyrolysis for liquid fuel
production is currently of particular interest because liquid fuel can be stored
and transported more easily and at lower cost than solid biomass. Pyrolysis
technology is currently at the demonstration stage, and technologies for
upgrading the bio-oil to transport fuels are applied at the R&D and pilots
stage.

 Chemical conversion:
This process known as transesterification is used for converting vegetable oils,
animal fats, and greases into fatty acid methyl esters (FAME), which are used
to produce biodiesel.

 Biological conversion:
It includes fermentation to convert biomass into ethanol and anaerobic
digestion to produce renewable natural gas. Ethanol is used as a vehicle fuel.
Renewable natural gas—also called biogas or bio methane—is produced in
anaerobic digesters at sewage treatment plants and at dairy and livestock
operations. It also forms in and may be captured from solid waste landfills.
Properly treated renewable natural gas has the same uses as fossil fuel natural
gas.

 Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Biomass as

Energy Source:
There are some pros and cons of using biomass as energy resorce which arew
following:
  Advantages
1. Biomass is always and widely available as a renewable source of energy.
2. Reducing landfill and overall waste is key to managing carbon levels.
3. Reduces the waste and landfills
4. It is less expensive than fossil fuels.
5. It is carbon neutral, biomass fuels only release the same amount of carbon
into the atmosphere as was absorbed by plants in the course of their life
cycle.

 Disadvantages
1. Biomass energy is not as efficient as fossil fuels, some biofuels, like
Ethanol, is relatively inefficient as compared to gasoline. In fact, it has to
be fortified with fossil fuels to increase its efficiency.
2. Can lead to deforestation
3. Biomass plants require a lot of space.
4. It is not entirely clean; the use of animal and human waste escalates the
amount of methane gases, which are also damaging to the environment.

 Conclusion:
Looking at biomass advantages and disadvantages means that, as with most of
the solutions on offer to combat the climate emergency, biomass is not a
whole solution, but part of it. As we draw closer to the deadline or finishing of
our fossil fuels and other non-renewable energy sources , there is a great need
for us to explore every availability, including renewable energy to meet the
demand of people in future .
References:
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/biomass-energy/

Biomass as a Sustainable Energy Source for the Future___ by Wiley