US has potential to produce more than a billion tons of biomass annually by 2040

Could substantially decrease greenhouse gas emissions and reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil
July 18, 2016


Oak Ridge National Laboratory | 2016 Billion-Ton Report

The U.S. has the potential to sustainably produce at least 1 billion dry tons of nonfood biomass resources annually by 2040, according to the 2016 Billion-Ton Report, jointly released by the U.S. Department of Energy and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. That amount would substantially decrease greenhouse gas emissions in the utility and transportation sectors and (as the domestic bioeconomy grows) reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil, the scientists project.

These renewable resources include agricultural, forestry and algal biomass, as well as waste. They encompass the current and future potential of biomass, from currently available logging and crop residues to future available algae and dedicated energy crops — all useable for the production of biofuel, biopower and bioproducts.

Current feedstock, sector consumption, and final product distribution, in million dry tons per year. Biomass resources are shown on the left and their allocations are shown on the right. The size of the flow is representative of the amount of biomass allocated to that end use. For this figure, contributions from landfill gas are represented as tons of biomass equivalent by applying a conversion factor of 0.2665 lb/scf (credit: U.S. DOE)

The report findings show that under a base-case scenario, the United States could increase its use of dry biomass resources from a current 400 million tons to 1.57 billion tons under a high-yield scenario.

The analysis was led by ORNL with contributions from 65 experts from federal agencies, national laboratories, universities (the University of Tennessee, North Carolina State University, South Dakota State University and Oregon State University), and private companies (Energetics, Inc. and Allegheny Science and Technology).

Proposed future feedstock supply system for transforming raw biomass into stable, tradeable
commodities suitable for long-distance transport and handling in existing infrastructure (credit: Idaho National Laboratory)

New to the 2016 report are assessments of potential biomass supplies from algae, from new energy crops (miscanthus, energy cane, eucalyptus), and from municipal solid waste. For the first time, the report also considers how the cost of pre-processing and transporting biomass to the biorefinery may impact feedstock availability.

Interactive tools available through the Bioenergy Knowledge Discovery Framework allow users to visualize biomass availability scenarios and  tailor the data by factors such as geographic area, biomass source and price. Researchers and decision makers can use these features to better inform national bioenergy policies and research, development and deployment strategies. Each diagram and map in the report is available in an interactive interface on the Bioenergy Knowledge Discovery Framework.

Volume 2 of the report, set for release later this year, will consist of a collection of analyses on the potential environmental sustainability effects of a subset of agricultural and forestry biomass production scenarios presented in volume 1. Volume 2 will also discuss algae sustainability, land use, and land management changes, and strategies to enhance environmental sustainability.