Abstract
In this paper we develop an agent-based model to explore a feasible way of simultaneously providing sufficient food and bioenergy feedstocks in China. Concerns over the competition for agricultural land resources between food and bioenergy supply hinder the further development of bioenergy, especially in China, the country that needs to feed the world’s largest population. Prior research has suggested the introduction of energy crops and reviewed the resulting agricultural land use change in China. However, there is a lack of quantitative studies which estimate the value, contribution, and impact of bioenergy for specific conditions at the county level and provide adequate information to guide local practices. To fill this gap, we choose the Jiangsu Province in China as a case study, build up a spatial-agent dynamic model of agricultural land use, and perform a sensitivity analysis for important parameters. The simulation results show that straw from conventional crops generally dominates Jiangsu’s biomass supply with a contribution above 85%. The sensitivity analyses reveal severe consequences of bioenergy targets for local land use. For Jiangsu Province, reclaimed mudflats, an alternative to arable lands for energy crop plantation, help to secure the local biomass supply and to alleviate the land use conflict between food and biomass production.
Highlights
Modern bioenergy has experienced a worldwide boost in the last decades in response to concerns over energy security and climate change [1,2,3]
Given that there is no commercial energy crop plantation in the base year, the land use changes for conventional crops and energy crops are presented in different ways: For conventional crops, relative land use changes are computed (Figure 6a–g), which are obtained by dividing the projected cultivated area for each crop in 2030 by the observed area in 2010
We develop a model to explore a cost-effective way to simultaneously reach food and bioenergy feedstock targets for Jiangsu Province
Summary
Modern bioenergy has experienced a worldwide boost in the last decades in response to concerns over energy security and climate change [1,2,3]. To simultaneously satisfy the demand for bioenergy feedstock and food, especially in the context of a fast growing bioenergy industry, previous studies have suggested a variety of options These include improved agricultural practices, plantation of dedicated energy crops, use of cellulosic biomass conversion technology, exploitation of marginal or degraded lands, and joint production of energy and animal feed [10,11,12,13,14,15]. This is especially true for China, which is rarely touched on in existing quantitative research To fill this gap, this study develops a spatial-agent dynamic model of agricultural land use to simulate the annual land use patterns after the introduction of energy crops.
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