UTILISATION - PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
For example:
- Forestry waste; (SOURCE)
Trim waste, bark, maintenance and felling offcuts (slash), sawdust from milling operations etc.
Based on the data available locally for pulp-wood forests, the quantity of Slash, bark and trim waste recoverable is approximately 27 tonne/Ha on an 8 year harvest cycle or some 3.86tonne/ha/annum average.
When applied to large, already-established commercial forests, this represents a most significant untapped resource that could be 'harvested' bundled, collected and delivered to a suitable processing facility for the recovery of the renewable energy from this waste product that is otherwise wastefully burned on-site or left as a fire-hazard in the plantation.
In addition, destumping is now carried out every second harvest (Eucalyptus saligna varieties) and could yield an additional volume of biomass that can then be utilised to offset the cost of the de-stumping operation.
USES for Forestry "waste":
Sawdust can be compressed into pellets or briquettes for use as a "Renewable Fuel" to replace fossil fuel resources.
General Forestry residues can be used as a feedstick for aither a dircet combustion type power generator or for Steam production for process requirements or for direct heat for drying and other induistrial applications.
More advances and efficianet usage suggests that these forestry residues should be processed through a Gasification process or via Pyrolisation to extract more than 100% impoved energy from the biomass (than is prossible by dircet combustion). - Animal farming
produces a considerable amount of waste from dung and litter that can
be collected and used effectively, to produce Methane gas, for use as a
direct/ on-farm fuel resource, or to power an electric generator system.
On smaller installations, this could be utilised as heating fuel for example for drying and steam production for process use or where the installation is large enough to sustain a power plant, the gas can also be used to power a generator for electricity production. This technology is already well established in Europe and locally also. - Crop farming
produces considerable tonnages of stover, chaff & trash after
harvest that can also be collected and utilised as a fuel resource or
for other effective economic recovery as feedstock for organic compost
to improve soil texture and condition and to reduce use of chemical
fertilisers.
Where volumes are sufficient to justify the cost of collection, budling and transportation to a BioMass-to-Energy processor, these post-harvest residues can be used as a fuel resource, in the same way as forestry residues in the explanation above. - BioDiesel plantations also produce a significant quantity of press cake waste, after the extraction of the usable vegetable oil.
Usually this residue is then utilised as animal feed, feedstock for organic fertiliser for example but where there is a surplus, this can then also be used as BioMass, for the substitution of other costly fuel resources, for heating and process steam or for electricity generation. - Compost:
Excess seed-cake, after expression of the vegetable oils can also be used as source for the production of organic compost.
