Modeling Woody Biomass Procurement for Bioenergy Production at the Atikokan Generating Station in Northwestern Ontario, Canada

Md Alam,Thakur Upadhyay,Reino Pulkki,Chander Shahi

doi:10.3390/en5125065

Abstract

Efficient procurement and utilization of woody biomass for bioenergy production requires a good understanding of biomass supply chains. In this paper, a dynamic optimization model has been developed and applied to estimate monthly supply and procurement costs of woody biomass required for the Atikokan Generating Station (AGS) in northwestern Ontario, based on its monthly electricity production schedule. The decision variables in the model are monthly harvest levels of two types of woody biomass, forest harvest residues and unutilized biomass, from 19,315 forest depletion cells (each 1 km2) for a one year planning horizon. Sixteen scenarios are tested to examine the sensitivity of the cost minimization model to changing economic and technological parameters. Reduction in moisture content and improvement of conversion efficiency showed relatively higher reductions in monthly and total costs of woody biomass feedstock for the AGS. The results of this study help in understanding and designing decision support systems for optimal biomass supply chains under dynamic operational frameworks.

Highlights

Biomass has great potential to be converted into renewable bioenergy, which has the advantage of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and ensures a sustainable supply of energy [1,2,3,4,5,6]
The forest cells selected for collecting forest harvest residue (FHR) are mainly located in the following five forest management units (FMUs): Crossroute Forest, Sapawe Forest, Dog River-Matawin Forest, Wabigoon Forest and Dryden Forest (Figure 4)
The complexities of procuring woody biomass feedstock to the Atikokan Generating Station (AGS) in NWO in the most cost effective way are handled by developing a non-linear dynamic programming model

Summary

Introduction

Biomass has great potential to be converted into renewable bioenergy, which has the advantage of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and ensures a sustainable supply of energy [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Replacing fossil fuels with bioenergy provides an excellent opportunity to develop energy security and increases rural economic activities [7]. Ontario (NWO) to replace lignite coal with renewable woody biomass as feedstock by 2014. The AGS presently utilizes lignite coal and operates at 30% of capacity [9]

Methods

Results

Conclusion