Roles for Biomass Energy in Sustainable Development

Advanced technologies such as gasifier/gas turbine systems for electric power generation and fuel cells for transportation make it possible for biomass to provide a substantial share of world energy in the decades ahead, at competitive costs. While biomass energy industries are being launched today using biomass residues of agricultural and forest product industries, the largest potential supplies of biomass will come from plantations dedicated to biomass energy crops. In industrialized countries these plantations will be established primarily on surplus agricultural lands, providing a new source of livelihood for farmers and making it possible eventually to phase out agricultural subsidies. The most promising sites for biomass plantations in developing countries are degraded lands that can be revegetated. For developing countries, biomass energy offers an opportunity to promote rural development. Biomass energy grown sustainably and used to displace fossil fuels can lead to major reductions in carbon dioxide emissions at zero incremental cost, as well as greatly reduced local air pollution through the use of advanced energy conversion and end-use technologies. The growing of biomass energy crops can be either detrimental or beneficial to the environment, depending on how it is done. Biomass energy systems offer much more flexibility to design plantations that are compatible with environmental goals than is possible with the growing of biomass for food and industrial fiber markets. There is time to develop and put into place environmental guidelines to ensure that the growing of biomass is carried out in environmentally desirable ways, before a biomass energy industry becomes well established.