Library Item
Biomass as feedstock for a bioenergy and bioproducts industry: The technical feasibility of a billion-ton annual supply
Description:
This joint study by the US DOE and USDA estimates the availability of biomass in the United States that can be harvested annually in a “sustainable” manner. The authors suggest there is 1.3B tons/year of biomass available, and this could conceivably be used to produce a significant fraction of liquid transportation fuel demand in the US.
This influential study provides an opportunity to discuss, among other things:
-how do different research and technology communities define sustainability?
-what aspects of the study have elicited the most comments?
-what aspects of a resource survey are valuable at the scale of this study and what technical, economic, environmental, and societal issues demand analysis at other length-scales in order to understand feasibility and impacts?
