Before the earthquake in Japan, support for nuclear energy was at a record high. In February 2011, US president Obama announced $8.3 billion (€5.8 billion) in loan guarantees for construction of the...

Sustainability criteria of solid and gaseous biomass is high on the agenda of the European Commission (EC) and will remain one of the important issues in the bioenergy sector until the end of this year....

It is possible that in time biomethane could become a valuable component of the economics of the anaerobic digestion (AD) industry. With only Didcot water works and Adnams’ Brewery with the ability to...

The UK government is introducing a new policy, the Renewable Heat Incentive, which is the first of its kind in the world and is aimed to cut carbon emissions associated with the production of heat. The...

The European Renewable Energy Council (EREC), as part of the Renewable Energy Policy Action Paving the Way towards 2020 (REPAP), has released three reports looking at the National Renewable Energy Action...

Some of the world’s simplest solutions come from existing resources. In Brazil sugarcane serves that purpose. It is a versatile crop by any standards — used for food, fuel, bioplastics and bioelectricity...

A 2009 Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) study estimates that the commercial biomass available and potentially available in Argentina is around 124 million tonnes in dry weight, made from wood and...

Drax Power (Drax) owns and operates the UK’s largest coal-fired power station. Over the last few years it has developed a range of options to expanding its biomass supply and generation base. Although...

Montpelier, the capital city of Vermont in Canada, is aiming to reduce its emissions by 80% by 2030 and has devised a biomass-fuelled district energy system to help it do so. As part of the scheme, more...

Rob Wilder drives an electric car, his home is powered by solar panels and he wrote Listening to the Sea, an economic and biological study of marine stewardship. Wilder also invented several financial...

The Energy Strategy 2050, the first of its kind in the world, aims to encourage the financial investment into renewable energy such as biogas and biomass, replacing coal with more sustainable energy production...

‘Trees were meant to be harvested.’ A bold and controversial view maybe, but one held by many within the biomass sector. David Nothmann is vice president of business and product development at ArborGen,...

March 2011 was something of a watershed for the bioenergy industry in the UK as the long-awaited Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) got the greenlight from the coalition government. The RHI, the first of its...

A recent study conducted by the University of Toronto in Canada has found converting coal-fired units at two Ontario-based power plants — Nanticoke and Atikokan — to burning wood pellets would reduce...

Gasification holds out the promise of increased efficiency compared to burning biomass to raise steam, especially in neighbourhood plants where the waste heat can be used for district heating. Burning...