Neeta Sharma - European Commissionec.europa.eu/research/iscp/pdf/india-eu-conference-2010/sharma_en.pdf · About ENEA Research Centre ENEA is the Italian National Agency for New Technologies,

BIOMASS/BIOWASTES/BIOENERGY

Partnering Initiative and Agricultural Production

Neeta SharmaUTTRI – BIOTECH,

ENEA, Italy

India-EU & Member States Partnership for a Strategic Roadmap in Research and Innovation, 11 - 12 Nov. 2010, New Delhi, India

About ENEA Research Centre

ENEA is the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (under Article 37, Law No. 99 of 23 July 2009).ENEA’s activities are targeted to “research, innovation technology and advanced services in the fields of energy and sustainable economic development”.

ENEA conducts scientific research and technology development activities and provides agency services in support to public administrations, public and private enterprises, and citizens.


INTERNATIONAL ACTIVITIES

ENEA promotes collaboration with the organisations and institutions of other countries in the scientific and technological spheres, providing specific expertise on request. The Agency’s main initiatives are undertaken in the following fields:

EUROPEAN UNION ACTIVITIES: EURATOM; Projects financed by EU Programmes; European Technological Platforms; Committees and Groups; Associations and networks; ENEA Liaison Office in Brussels. BILATERAL COOPERATION: 27 bilateral agreements at presentMULTILATERAL COOPERATION: 14 in place,IEA; IAEA; OECD; NEA INTERNATIONAL INITIATIVES: EUREKA; ITER; ITPA; CSLF; GIF; IPHE; VAMAS

The list of Cultural, Scientific and Technological Working Programs can be consulted at the website of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.



Steam Explosion Plant

Integrated systemof environmental

monitoring

Laser Station

Rare-earth elements Plant

Integrated Innovation Centre

Gasification Plant

ITREC Plant

Integrated Metrology

Centre

Plants forwaste treatment

Advanced Technologies and services

Multifunctional facility: Specialised Laboratories and a multipurpose Installation Complex (Technological Hall)

Research Centre Trisaia – AGROBIOPOLIS: Integrated Innovation Centre


Important Research Areas on biomass

Dedicated energy crops

Biofuels from lignocellulosic materials through

biotechnological processes

Biofuels from synthesis

Electric power distributed in co/trigeneration order

R

Experimental Platform of Gassification Plants

letto fisso P= 30-80 KWe

Cella a combustibile a carbonati fusi

125 kWe

Gassificatore a doppio letto fluido a vapore

500 kWt

Gassificatore a letto fluido interconnesso

1,3 MWt Gassificatore a letto fisso controcorrente

150 kWt

Scrubber + filtri

Oli vegetaliFiltri a coalescenza

Scrubber ad emulsioni

MCI

metanolo

Turbina a gas

GassifiersSystems for the gas Cleaning Applications

1000 kWt

150 kWt

80 kWt

Hydrosyn

Letto fisso Up draft

letto FissoDown draft

idrogeno

Filtri elettrostatici

Filtri ceramici

Fuel Cell

PRODUCT GAS

BIOMASS

PRODUCT GASPRODUCT GAS

AIR

THERMOCOUPLE

NOZZLE

REFRACTORY

WALL

COMBUSTION

REDUCTION

ZONE

CYLINDRICAL

CHAMBER

Scrubber a biodiesel

500 kWt

DFB

The EU Directive on RES– General

Overview of situation in MS

Renewable energy in final energy consumption (2020 target) (From Europe's Energy Portal)


Each Member State has set their specific goals that are still not in compliance with the objectives set..

Increasing interest in 2nd generation biofuels

• The mandatory target concerning with 10% renewable energy included in the total fossil fuels consumed within EU by 2020 could be fulfilled only if a significant amount of “second generation”biofuels will be produced and sell on the market, in order to avoid possible competition with food crops

• 2nd generation biofuels can be produced without environmentally harmful impacts because of:

use of no-food feedstock, as cellulose (forestry / agriculture residues, grasses) and other non-conventional raw materials

(organic wastes, algae etc.)

higher potential to reduce GHG

new processes and technological approaches, including biotechnological ones

Biorefineries & Sustainably derived Biomass feedstocks

The concept of Biorefinery

Development of advanced or second generation biorefineries on the basis of more sustainably-derived biomass feedstocks, and cleaner thermochemical and biological conversion technologies to efficiently produce a range of different energy carriers and marketable co-products.


Recommendations

To accelerate the development of commercial-scale biorefineries, creating value for the renewable fuels and agricultural industries and leading the way toward a low-carbon economy

energy demand be minimized,

safer processes used,

hazardous chemical use and production avoided

waste production minimized

Further research to produce new bio-products and develop new processes to make this bio-based production system more economic and sustainable to that based on fossil fuels.


Biorefining best suited/ well selected primary e/o waste raw materials for the optimum economic and social use of the bio-resources in a bio-based bioeconomy.

Feedstocks (carbon–based raw material) provided from four distinct sectors: agriculture (dedicated crops and residues), forestry, industries (process residues and leftovers) and households (municipal solid waste and wastewaters) and aquaculture (algae and seaweed).

EU legislation and regulatory tools on biofuels

RESOURCES

LEGISLATION

IMPLEMENTATION

To meet the Bioenergy targets


Biomass Resources

• Residues Mtoe

- Agric. & Agro-industry 5

- Forest & wood Industry 4.3

- MSW 0.3

- Livestock residues 10-12

• Firewood 2

• Dedicated crops 3-5

• Total Resource Potential 24-28


RESOURCES

Overall biomass availability

24-28 Mtoe/y

Target for 2020

16 MtoeBottlenecks:

due to higher costs of collection & lack of well founded chain agreement, only 30-50% of biomass can be gathered


At present more than 60 laws and decrees

are in force, that have with direct or indirect

connection with bioenergy

But obstacles are encountered due to is lack of long-term stability of

regulations and delay in Isssuing the implementation decrees owing to

complex procedures for getting permits and gaining incentives

Regulations


• Lack of long-term stability of regulations

• Delay in issuing the implementation decrees

following the promulgation of laws

• Unclear definition of virgin, residual and wasted biomass

Moreover Obstacles are encountered for project implementation owing to complex procedures for getting permits and gaining incentives


Bottlenecks

A Brief Overview

- Agricultural production

- Dedicated biomass crops

Various forms of land use in Italy

• Total surface area - 301,338 sq.km

• Total Agricultural farm area -226,200 sq.km

• Area used for agriculture compared to the total farm area (75%) - 158,340 sq.km (52%)


Implement reliable bioenergy feedstock supply based on local resources

create a centralized mechanism for sharing geospatial data, and maps of the biomass derived from different resources: agriculture, forestry and energy crops etc.

Biomass atlas: Initial steps to develop an interactive WebGIS and geodatabase providing map and data services

To help the public administration to define the strategies for the development of renewable energy chains

Biomass assessment


Renewable Plant materials

Biomass Suitable conversion Energy & value added bio-products

• Agricultural Feedstocks

- agricultural and livestock by-products - energy crops/dedicated crops

(plants purposely grown for energy)

to avoid increasing concerns over imp. social issues-

• potential of bioenegy to compete with food security• environ. problems, • land degradation

26India-EU & Member States Partnership for a Strategic Roadmap in Research and Innovation, 11 - 12 Nov. 2010, New Delhi, India

Experiments conducted at ENEA have provided some of the best data on how various bioenergy crops improve many factors essential for the sustainable agriculture concept.

Agroenergy production and development


ENEA main RTD activities on biomass & bioenergy

• Screening and evaluation of the productivity and duration of some perennial herbaceous crops, with the main objective of identifying the more promising species and varieties for marginal or abandoned lands in the climatic conditions of Southern Med. areas

• Research & development of new technologies for the production of liquid bio-fuels (bioethanol, biodiesel) & bio-products from non conventional crops or the agricultural and food- industries by-products.


• PRISCA (1993)

Cellulose and Biomass CropsAnnual Crops

Perennial Crops

• CYNARA (1993)

• MISCANTHUS NETWORK (1993)

• SWITCHGRASS NETWORK (1998)

ENEA has been one of the first one in Italy and Europe to perform research studies on warm season perennial grasses as energy crops for the assessment of land use availability for energy grass production systems

29India-EU & Member States Partnership for a Strategic Roadmap in Research and Innovation, 11 - 12 Nov. 2010, New Delhi, India

RESEARCH PROJECTS

Amongst various crops tested, four perennial grasses, viz., Miscanthus, Switchgrass, Arundo and Cynara have been identified as important crops for cost effective and environmentally benign biomass production.

DEDICATED CROPS CULTIVATED AT ENEA

Miscanthus experimental fields at ENEA Research Centre Trisaia

Switchgrass fields (panicum virgatum L.) at ENEA Trisaia



• Improved soil conservation,• Improved energy gain (more ethanol energy can be produced per hectare growing sw than with an annual crop like corn, because of reduced energy investments at all the steps of the crop prod. & conv. pathways leading to ethanol formation)• Energy balance in terms of fossil energy ratio FER: corn grain ethanol about 1.6, biodiesel 3, cellulosic ethanol from 5-10 depending upon biomass source as compared to 0.8 of gasoline, indicating that it takes more energy to make gasoline than we get out of it.• Improved reductions in emissions of carbon dioxide; from growing sw to burning the ethanol in a car engine - emits 94% less GHG emissions than gasoline

Environmental benefits of perennial energy crops

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projects that continued emissions will lead to a temperature increase between 1.1 and 6.4C over the period 1990–2100 .

One of the negative effects of climate change includes possible reduction in crop yields.

Better agricultural practices and the use of species that have higher levels of draught and salt tolerance and positive impact on the fertility of soil, limit the emission of greenhouse gases, are required.

Switchgrass is one of such an alternative.

Energy crops could be a viable production alternative in the agricultural sector without any significant competition with food production

Reseeding marginal cropland with potentially feasible perennial biomass crops, may offer many advantages to develop biofuel industry in the less fertile regions

A careful crop selection and multi-cropping cultivation can make the raw materials available all the year round for biofuels for transport as well as electricity production withoutany need to store large quantities of biomass.

Identification of the biomass strategies to emphasize the development and the formation of policies and rules that facilitate appropriate biomass production and use.

S T & I challenges and Needs

India-EU & Member States Partnership for a Strategic Roadmap in Research and Innovation, 11 - 12 Nov. 2010, New Delhi,

More studies are required on the potential of these crops on marginal areas in many parts of Europe, to avoid the competition with food crops.

To set new approaches to study how the use of some beneficial microorganisms/bacteria may help crop plants to cope with the biotic and abiotic stress. These investigations will bring more insight on the interactions between plants and beneficial bacteria that might have a profound effect on crop health and yield and soil quality.

Research on the energy conversion process; which crop is more suitable in relation with energy conversion types such as ethanol, syngas or pyrolisis etc.).

37

ENEA interest in “2nd generation″ biofuels

• Biofuels are today the only direct substitute for oil in transport that is available on a significant scale

• The proposed target concerning with 10% renewable energy included in the total fossil fuels consumed within EU by 2020 could be fulfilled only if a significant amount of “second generatin” biofuels will be produced and sell on the market, in order to avoiding possible competition with food crops

• 2nd generation biofuels can be produced without environmentally harmful impacts because of:

use of no-food feedstock, as cellulose (forestry / agriculture residues, grasses) and other non-conventional raw materials (organic wastes, algae etc.)

higher potential to reduce GHG

new processes and technological approaches, including biotechnological ones

Present Projects

Industry 2015 Project (North Italy): aimed to develop an industrial technology for the production of bioethanol from lignocellulosic materials, has already been started recently in the province of Alexandrina.

It is planned to build a demonstration plant with a capacity of about 20,000 tonnes per year of bioethanol.

The technology will use low cost feedstock for biofuel production creating new opportunities for the farming community.

MULTISORGO: "Integrated production of bioethanol and biogas from sweet sorghum: technological, economic, energy and environmental aspects", financed by MiPAF

FITOPROBIO: "Phytodepuration treatments using cellulosic biomass to obtain second generation ethanol", financed by MiPAF


Bioethanol : Industrial application

•Resa di EtOH ≥ 0.25 g/gBIOMASSA•Resa di etanolo per ettaro EtOH ≥ 100 hl/ha •Costo di produzione EtOH < 0.5 €/l

Progetto Mossi & Ghisolfi -ENEAImpianto pilota da 40.000 t/aImpianto industriale da 200.000 t/a

Obiettivi:

ETANOLO DA CELLULOSA

NOTA: VALE DOPPIO AI FINI DEL 10%

OSSERVAZIONE: IL PIANO DI AZIONE NAZIONALE CHE PREVEDE SOLO 100.000 TON AL 2020 DI BIOETANOLO DI 2° GENERAZIONE POTREBBE ESSERE SOTTOSTIMATO

Present Projects

BIOSEGEN "Innovative chain for the production of second-generation biofuels from agricultural and agro-industrial residues and biomass crops.

Theme: Development of alternatives production chain for the production of second generation biofuels based on new process technologies and use of lignocellulosic substrates as feedstock.

Objectives: Assessment of sustainable energetic, environmental and economic

feasibility of dedicated energy crops, trees and grasses, suitable for marginal or set aside lands


Present Project Activities

Bioenergy production (hydrogen, ethanol and methane) from wastes/wastewater Hydrogen and ethanol production using organic solid wastes (OSW) as substrate mixed up with biomass derived from the plant Helianthus tuberosus (topinambur)* which has a high content of sugars such as inuline and fructose.

*Topinambur is cultivated in a field in the surroundings of a landfill site where no food crops are allowed.


Future plans

Scaling up of the H2 production process and use of different substrates (industrial wastes) to produce hydrogen and ethanol.

Set up of a second fermentation step to produce methane. The bacterial consortium must be selected from natural sources. The capability of the selected consortium to produce methane from the effluent of the first fermentation will be checked and also its diversity will be investigated.


Related activities/projects to Coordination action

Bioresource Technology Unit (BTU), NTUA Greece, focuses in several areas relevant to this coordination action:

•Bioresources (evaluating the resource base)

•Biorefineries (preparing feedstocks for optimal conversion - using intelligent methods to limit the unsustainable high costs dev by BTU will be applied)

•Biofuels – novel bioconversion pathways (design, feasibility and diffusion of new technologies)


Use of sweet sorghum in the biorefinery

1. Southern Europe and India are among the areas of the world with the highest productivity of sweet sorghum, and this is very interesting in terms of knowledge exchange and expansion.

2. Above all, the identification of pathways for efficient utilization of the lignocellulosic residue of sweet sorghum - bagasse, for the production of biofuels and chemicals is of critical importance for the development of 2nd generation biofuels and the biorefinery concept.

A part of the potential role of the lignin of the bagasse in the biorefinery has been recently revealed. Lignin is very important because it is undesirable in the fermentation processes but very promising for the biorefinery. The optimization of the pretreatment of sweet sorghum bagasse is required for the efficient delignification of the bagasse.


Total fresh sweet sorghum yields (t/ha) in various EU regions

A. Glynos, NTUA, 2004


Pretreatment of sweet sorghum bagassefor biofuel production

Panagiotopoulos et al., 2010

NaOH pretreatment

Sweet sorghum bagasse, 100 gcellulose 39hemicellulose 21lignin 18free sucrose 8

pretreated biomass, 77 gcellulose 38hemicellulose 18lignin 10

enzymatic hydrolysis

H20 wash

residue, 42 gcellulose 19hemicellulose 10lignin 6

C5, C6 and C12fermentation

C5, C6, C12 sugars

32 gGlc 20Xyl+Ara 8Sucr 4

dark liquordecomposed ligninhydrolysed hemicellulosesucrose, 3 g


There is a need to open up a new era -produce and use energy differently.

Intensive research efforts need to be undertaken to further advance this technology.

In order to create real dynamics and new synergy, we should unite supply and demand in the same place.

47

Conclusions


KBBE.2011.4-05: EU – India Partnering Initiative on biomass production and bio waste conversion through biotechnological approaches – Mandatory India; Call: FP7-KBBE-2011-5

To map out what the European Union and its Member States could do together with India to find solutions to challenges/needs


to promote program-level cooperation in both regions, in line with the scope and priorities of the SFIC (Strategic Forum for International S & T cooperation)

•Integration of the dispersed findings from Europe and India in a synthesis which will allow the identification of common areas and knowledge gaps in the biomass production and conversion in the Europe and India.

•Selection of the most promising biomass types in both areas is one of the major targets.

EU-India Partnering Initiative in the area of Biomass and Biowaste


The Green Economy

The economy based on sustainable development •should be environmental sustainability (an economic system that respects the integrity of ecosystems), socially justifiable and locally based.•includes green energy generation based on renewable energy to substitute for fossil fuels and energy conservation for efficient energy use.

Right planning is urgently needed to avoid the incompatibilitiesbetween the governments and the international community and how the governments should promote the green economy within their national borders and cooperate in their promotionalefforts at a coordinated international level.


51

Thanks for your kind attention

Dr. Neeta Sharma

e-mail: [email protected]


Documents

Neeta Sharma - European Commissionec.europa.eu/research/iscp/pdf/india-eu-conference-2010/sharma_en.pdf · About ENEA Research Centre ENEA is the Italian National Agency for New Technologies,