Number of years the United States could meet its energy needs by burning all its trees: 1.
- Harpers List, January 2006
Ironically, just as delegates in Copenhagen are ramping up efforts to preserve forests globally to slow global warming, a technology that has the opposite effect is poised to wreak havoc on forests around the world. It's called biomass burning: chipping up trees and burning them in power plants to create electricity.
The idea is that if you replace burning fossil fuels with burning wood the planet and climate will be better off. The concept that burning anything is good for the climate seems a little suspect, but could a civilization with six billion people, spaceships, and microwave ovens power itself by burning trees? Probably not.
But after being erroneously labeled carbon neutral at Kyoto biomass burning is ramping up all over the world in the name of green energy. If delegates at Copenhagen fail to correct this error and remove woody biomass burning from the roster of technologies deemed "carbon neutral" the net result could be not to save the forests, but to destroying them.
An exaggeration?
Here's what top climate scientists including one who helped write most of the Kyoto protocols recently had to say about the mistake that allows the felling and burning of trees to be defined as carbon neutral:
This loophole gives oil companies, power plants and industries that face tighter pollution limits a cheap, yet erroneous, means to claim reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. According to a number of studies, including one by a U.S. Department of Energy lab, applying this incentive globally could lead to the loss of most of the world's natural forests as carbon caps tighten.
The loss of most of the world's natural forests? Those who think the planet can survive THAT raise your hand.
How did we get into this jam? Most of us have fond memories of campfires and wood burning is as old as humanity. But forest collapse is also as old as humankind and probably the most common way civilizations collapse. In fact let's play a little game. It's called see if you can spot the forest:
Can't find any? This used to be the lushly forested place called Mesopotamia, the Cradle of Civilization: modern day Iraq, Iran and the Middle East. I would be a little cranky too if my trees we're all gone.
Biomass Burning Delusion # 1: Burning trees doesn't produce carbon dioxide.
Burning any carbon based fuel produces carbon dioxide. That's what burning is, carbon plus oxygen yields heat and CO2 and some other stuff called pollution. Woody biomass burning as it turns out produces more carbon dioxide than burning fossil fuels. You can pass laws and sign treaties but when you take a match to wood it releases carbon dioxide.
"Biomass burning produces fifty percent more carbon dioxide even than coal because it burns less efficiently," say Biologist Rachel Smolker of U.K. based Biofuelwatch. Some would say three times as much, others argue that wood and coal are closer to equal in CO2 production. But there is certainly no fuel WORSE than wood burning carbon dioxide wise.
Biomass Burning Delusion #2: When you cut and burn a tree it invigorates the growth of the forest which then takes up the CO2 you released by burning the tree.
Here's what really happens: During simulated timber harvest, on-site carbon storage is reduced considerably and does not approach old-growth storage capacity for at least 200 years.
Turns out as long as trees are alive they are growing and storing CO2 in roots, branches, trunks and leaves. It makes sense that a one-ounce seedling cannot replicate the carbon uptake of a multi-ton tree, not for centuries anyway. Second growth can seem vigorous because the replacement trees mine the nutrients from pervious generations of trees stored in the soil. And after the third or fourth cutting? All bets are off.
"People believe there is some magic in nature," said Smolker. "That you can keep taking and things will grow back."
Apparently not. In many places already industrial monoculture forests are already being fertilized and treated with pesticides and herbicides.
Biomass Burning Delusion #3: If we don't burn trees they will eventually just rot and release their carbon anyway.
Actually nature has plans for that dead tree. For one it's food for the next generation of forest life. And it turns out trees are pretty good at transferring their CO2 to the soil rather than the atmosphere when they fall over dead. Underground roots of mushrooms called mycorrhiza digest the wood and keeps the carbon the trees had sucked from the air in the forest soil
The proof? It's called coal.
Millions of generations of plants and trees have taken in carbon from the air and deposited it as mountains of coal. It's what trees and plants do. Because trees and plants took the CO2 out of the atmosphere we have the nice comfortable climate we enjoy today. It's not their fault we're releasing everything they worked so hard to lock away, and if we cut then down they are going to have that much more difficult of a time soaking the carbon back up.
Biomass Burning Delusion # 4: Only "waste wood" or "certified sustainable" wood will be burned for biomass.
I asked a fellow who oversees the State Forest where I live, some of which you can see in the photo below, how much "waste" per acre could be gotten from land like this for biomass burning.
"There's not enough waste to bother with," he scoffed. "We're talking whole trees,"
"How much forest is available to be used for biomass?" I asked.
"None," he answered. In a state where the governor has proclaimed, "we have plenty of biomass, come and get it!" a fellow could get fired for saying something like that. He went on to describe a logging rotation that would have the forest completely cut in fifty years--a long time for humans, but the blink of an eye for the forest.
Randy Bond enjoying a sustainable Michigan forest near his home.
Here is the frightening thing. Notice what's coming up beneath all that logging slash? Nothing. Unless men plant more pines this forest is kaput after only two cuttings. And now here come the biomass plants.
Here is what one local TV reporter found when he looked into what was actually going on in the name of sustainable forestry: Massachusetts Chainsaw Massacre
NOT a redwood, but an American chestnut tree in Tennessee. Seen any trees this large recently where you live?
Biomass Burning Delusion #5: Biomass burning is "local" energy.
Ponder these postings from a website where people buy and sell commodities like coal and oil shipped across ocean:
That's right, an international trade in trees for burning has sprouted up. A recent Bloomberg headline called wood the "new coal." "Wood is becoming a hot commodity in a new low-carbon world," the article proclaimed. Indeed you can find trees including tropical hardwoods and softwoods for biomass burning for sale from every continent. This is the opposite of the local biomass miracle we've been promised.
Simone Lovera of the Global Forest Coalition in Paraguay told the UK newspaper The Independent, "Europe is going to cook the world's tropical forests to fight climate change; it's crazy."
Of course just in case Africa, Asia, Indonesia, and South America don't have enough trees to fuel the biomass burning fantasies of Europe, a nice company from Sweden called JCE Group AB, is helping the people of Florida liberate their extra forests. 150 truck loads of trees PER DAY are ground up and shipped to Europe for biomass burning to the tune of 400,000 metric tons per year. Of course they don't even bother to pretend it's waste wood.
Biomass Burning Delusions # 6 and #7: That biomass is biomass; and "biomass" burning pollutes less than fossil fuels.
Here in northern Michigan at least two of our "biomass" plants burn old tires. Others shovel in old houses and creosote soaked railroad ties. I don't know what's "bio" about all this crap but the energy you get is considered carbon neutral and renewable.
Burning anything pollutes, and burning wood, while putting out fewer pollutants such as mercury and sulfur dioxide than coal, also puts out even more fine particulates that are hazardous to human health as well as volatile organic compounds, nitrous oxides, and unusual things like aluminum. Biomass plant advocates often claim they will use advanced technology like gasification, co-generation and scrubbers. The reality is that whatever applies to "clean wood" also applies to "clean coal."
And of course since biomass also can include tires, who knows what the heck is in the air. That's not all that get's burned. Even the world's largest trash incinerator in Detroit is considered green energy. When someone tells you that biomass plants meet air pollution standards and are therefore "clean" remind them that so does even the world's largest green energy waste incinerator, as do all coal plants.
Biomass Burning Delusion #8: Renewables are ready to power the world.
Maybe you've seen this headline: "Google's $10 Million Investment in Geothermal Indicates the Green Revolution is Underway."
Sounds great, doesn't it? But did you see THIS headline: "Swiss geothermal power plan abandoned after quakes hit Basel."
It's been known for several years that geothermal drilling can cause earthquakes but unbelievably projects in California went right on ahead. Just this week Al Gore told the world that geothermal had unlimited potential. And maybe it does, but right now it's not ready for any role. The California geothermal project after collecting tens of millions in government grants and private investments shut down last Friday over problems getting the technology to work, as well as earthquake fears.
What about tide and wave power? After numerous setbacks and tens of millions of dollars a tide power project in New York barely produces enough electricity for a single grocery store. Off the coasts of Oregon and California wave power equipment has been beaten to death by the ocean.
"It's frustrating sometimes as an ocean energy company to say, yeah, your device sank," said Jason Bak.
Maybe wind, tide, and geothermal might prove useful someday but right now they are not anything we can rely on. But surely wind and solar are better? Yes. They both produce electricity. But how much and how useable?
One of the little known secrets of the renewable energy movement is that variable energy like solar and wind are not terribly useful in a modern energy grid. Every light bulb and computer in your life has to have EXCATLY the right amount of electricity precisely when you turn them on. Only base load power provided by fossil fuels, nuclear or hydroelectric can ramp up and down to meet demand like that. Solar and wind march to their own drummer and are called variable power.
How much variable energy can a grid accept? Around ten percent, twenty percent tops it appears. For instance, only about 16% of Denmark's electricity is produced by their 5500 offshore wind turbines (pdf). But even that is only possible because Denmark is connected to the huge European grid of nuclear, hydroelectric and coal fired base load power plants. Without those plants Denmark's wind power would be useless. Put another way, how much useful electricity would Denmark be getting from their wind farms if the coal, nuclear and hydroelectric plants shut down?
Zero.
Same everywhere from Denver to Dubai. You cannot run a grid on variable energy. And now you see the reason why Denmark and Europe are scarfing up the forests of the world to fuel their biomass plants and the delusion that they are obtaining a huge fraction of their energy from renewable, carbon neutral sources. Biomass burning may be base load but it's fools gold. It's not sustainable, it's not carbon neutral and it's not going to work out.
But here's the result of mandating "renewable" energy and allowing biomass burning to be part for the mix. Where I live in Traverse City, Michigan we have one (broken for the moment) wind turbine, a small wind farms in another county we can buy a little power from--and plans to build a wood-fired power plants, one of a dozen already operating or planned for Michigan.
The director of our local electricity producer said about biomass burning, "Solar and wind are variable power and our customers need base load and biomass is the only base load renewable." The confession that there is no renewable base load energy and so it all comes down to burning trees is an astounding one.
Any renewable energy target while biomass burning is on the table means the renewable energy mix will be heavily skewed toward biomass because it provides base load power and is far more useful than wind or solar. (And far dirtier.) The presence of biomass in the green energy mix prevents utilities, communities and corporations from working harder to develop and deploy technologies that might actually work and help overcome the limits of variable energy.
A PLEA
If recent reports hold true you, the delegates at Copenhagen, are to be lauded for recognizing that forests are the planet's last, best hope for stopping climate change. Your quest to save the forests to mitigate climate change will fail though unless you also banish woody biomass burning..
I also propose something new: if you get a carbon credit for planting a tree, you have to get a carbon punishment for cutting one down and halting it's uptake of CO2, and another punishment for burning the tree since you now released it's CO2 when we can least afford. These punishments combined with credits for leaving forests uncut could do the trick along with banishing woody biomass buring.
The reality is that we got into this mess because we have pigged out on a one-time inheritance of ancient biomass in the form of fossil fuels. We can't get out of this by burning more stuff and rebranding it green. Twenty-five million Americans in the 1800's ran through most of the trees of North America to heat homes, power trains and build cities. It's not going to work for 300 million American's with far greater energy needs. A civilization trying to run Chevy Volts and a billion televisions on trees is doomed.
Burning trees will make global warming worse, possibly a lot worse. Let's put a stop to it. The time is now. What other time will there be?
Consider this: on your way to Copenhagen you may have purchased something called carbon offsets: trees planted in the hope they will sequester the CO2 you just emitted by flying. But now others are coming along and BURNING trees in the name of reducing CO2. Which one is REALLY more likely to save the planet:
I am going with the letting the trees grow thing.
The Story of Gilgamesh
After a moment of enjoying the glory and awe of the magnificent, virgin cedar forest, Gilgamesh and his lumberjack companions began destroying the abode of the gods. They cut the cedars, chopped their branches and trunks into transportable sizes. A fight erupted between the intruders and the mighty forest demigod... the greed of civilization won; the forest's guardian lost his head; and the cedars wailed with fear now that Gilgamesh was master of the forest. The trees were correct to cry, for the men stripped the mountains of their cover, leaving bare rock. When Enlil, who forever must watch over the well-being of the earth, learned of the destruction of the cedar forest, he sent down a series of ecological curses on the offenders: May the food you eat be eaten by fire; may the water you drink be drunk by fire. - Summary by Rania Masri
The earliest record of major anthropogenic deforestation in the Ghab Valley, northwest Syria: a palynological study:
... Following the lateglacial climatic amelioration, deciduous oak forest gradually expanded at the foot of Mt. Ansarie since 14,500 14C yr BP. Then this forest was cleared by Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) people 9000 14C yr BP, supposed to be the oldest record of forest clearance by humans. After this deforestation, the vegetation was replaced by secondary pine forest, possibly with some cultivated plants such as olive and wheat...The clearance of Lebanese cedar trees began 7700 14C yr BP. . . the deciduous oak and Lebanese cedar forest had almost disappeared from the eastern slope of Mt. Ansarie by around 4900 14C yr BP... As described in the epic of Gilgamesh, forests completely disappeared from the Mesopotamian and Mediterranean districts. - Yoshinori Yasuda, Hiroyuki Kitagawab and Takeshi Nakagawaa
SEVEN TRUTHS THAT SPEAK FOR THE TREES
1) Saving our forests (and that doesn't mean more tree plantations) is the best way to stop global warming and save humanity.
2) Deforestation is just as likely to result in the end of humanity as climate change and it's right on track to do so.
3) Burning things is the most insane way to stop global warming since doctors drilled holes in skulls to let the demons out and gave you a bill for it.
4) There is no extra in nature and there is not enough "bio" on the planet to be burned, turned to ethanol, biodiesel or jet fuel, or bio-charcoal.
5) Woody biomass falsely deemed renewable energy increases the CO2 in the atmosphere, destroys forests, and prevents renewables from being fully explored.
6) Geo-engineering the forests, atmosphere or oceans to stop global warming isn't going to work. We can't even figure out how to stop carp from taking over a river or bugs from eating a forest.
7) There is a possibility that the only way to heal the planet is to get control of our own numbers and consumption while letting nature do the work she has done for three billion years: run the planet.
Follow Jeff Gibbs on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jeffgibbstc
Gabe Crane: Tu B'Shvat: An Ancient Jewish Holy Day for Modern Environmentalists
If you're interested in biofuels check out this great website with hundreds of case studies on emerging green technologies and alternative energies: http://www.greencollareconomy.com It has the largest b2b green directory on the web and lots of sustainability white papers for businesses to use in moving forward with biofuels.
As for the naysayers--Yes yes, anyone in the know has heard that young forests take up more CO2 than mature forests...http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1998/12/981210082058.htm.....however silviculture is NOT sustainable and burning up carbon sinks (which is what a forest is, just as a coal and oil are) is NOT carbon neutral.
This twisted interpretation of science turned into a policy that includes biomass plants as a carbon neutral strategy is mortifying.
I really appreciate you calling attention to this Jeff. Keep on keeping on.
Residential burning has destroyed the lives of many and will continue to do so unless bans are put into place to stop those that cannot be stopped in any other way except for lengthy and expensive means. There is no valid reason to pollute the air that we all need to breathe.
Burning anything is an affront to everyone!
Some that burn have used the excuse that they aren't putting out as much particulate matter as big business. But, add all those burners together and you will find that to be an erroneous statement used only to try to justify their burning in their own minds. Others blame the high cost of alternate heating means. The list of excuses is endless.
Some of us, such as myself, have lived through the horror of actually being forced from our homes because a neighbor decided that he had the 'right to burn' and could not be stopped. It came as a total surprise to him that, yes, he could be stopped and sued as well.
I'd like to know why it is the victim of wood smoke invasion that pays so dearly, physically, mentally and financially when this issue could be prevented if there were laws put into place?
It should be as obvious as night and day!
The Forestry Commission in Australia has placed itself above the law. They are logging and clearfelling rainforest, old growth and mixed aged forest with impunity just to meet wood supply agreements for woodchipmills.
Forestry calculate that CO2 released during logging equals that taken up during growth. This theory might hold in EU countries where the main source of wood is from plantations, but these industrial logging practices ensure that the forest barely regrows after logging. Eucalypt forests recovery for removal of CO2 from the atmosphere can take more than a 100 years.
Australia tells you that logging rotations are 100 years. This a plain untruth. Currently logging rotations are sometimes barely five years.
The assumption that there are near-equilibrium conditions (synchrony) in native forest logged is erroneous. FNSW do not replant after logging native forest, have only 23,000 hectares available for sequestration.
The IPCC state:
For Forest Land, synchrony is unlikely if significant woody biomass is
killed and the net emissions should be reported ie clearing of native forest.
Currently FNSW CO2 emissions on the South Coast alone are over 61 000 000 tonnes per year.
Our government's practice of decrying developing countries illegal logging, while sanctioning illegal logging in Australia is an intellectual dishonesty, therefore they endorse the huge amounts of GHG emissions released.
We are now facing the proposal of a wood fired power station in Eden- over our dead bodies!!!
A carbon-based fuel cannot be "carbon-neutral"
http://burningissues.org/forum/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=14
A carbon-based fuel cannot be "carbon-neutral"
http://burningissues.org/forum/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=668
We should be exporting pellets.
The solution is based on the conversion of a significant proportion of the central home heating systems in Maine from oil to wood pellet fuel. The conversion to wood pellet fuel will cut heating costs in homes and businesses almost in half. The production of some of the fuel from Maine forests will employ many Maine workers and most importantly will keep the money spent on home heating in the State rather than sending it to the Middle East. The conversion to a renewable carbon neutral fuel will have a positive impact on the environment through a substantial reduction in the production of greenhouse gases.
http://maineenergysystems.com/company_information.htm
SACE's "Yes We Can: Southern Solutions for a National Renewable Energy Standard"
http://bit.ly/SACE_RES
WRI's "Local Clean Power" http://bit.ly/WRI-RES
In short, America has an abundance of renewable energy sources. These coupled with massive increases in energy efficiency can put a serious dent (25% in 15 years) in our fossil-fueled electricity addiction.
Seriously? Come on! There are decades of peer reviewed research on these topics, demonstrating how biomass can be carbon-neutral. A serious documentarian might have referred to some of the following science:
The best science on biomass life-cycle analysis begins with the following peer-reviewed paper:
"A SUMMARY OF LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT STUDIES CONDUCTED ON BIOMASS, COAL, AND NATURAL GAS SYSTEMS"
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~baallen/Life%20Cycle%20Assessment.pdf
Another very good paper is: "Biomass Power and Conventional Fossil Systems with and without CO2 Sequestration – Comparing the Energy Balance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Economics"
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/32575.pdf
Or if you're a visual learner, here's a slide show of the same paper:
http://cemendocino.ucdavis.edu/files/67669.pdf
Anyway, I'm convinced we can do it without harming our environment. I'm also convinced that we MUST use biopower to get coal off the grid quickly. James Hansen agrees with this imperative. So does Bill McKibben. And Al Gore. And I recently learned that James Lovelock is supportive of biochar!
Oh, wait you have links! Did you read them? They talk about a few uses of alternative energy that depend upon a fossil fuel infrastructure to exist and many "proposed" solutions. Proposed? I've proposed that I can change lead to gold and then un-fuse the atoms and provide limitless energy. It will be up and running in 50 years. Are you going to bet you life on my magic? I doubt it, I guess instead you'll just listen to the guys who say what you to hear and have a financial interest in you listening. We have been trying to solve our energy crises way before we ran out of wood and whales a long time ago. And now you're on board with trying it again. Remind me how it worked out last time? I plan on looking into what has been said here and what it means to our future.
I don't understand. There are lots of examples of biopower that DOES work, does NOT harm the environment, reduces coal combustion, and keeps ratepayer money recirculating in the rural economy.
One example exists in my home state or North Carolina. It's called Craven County Wood Energy. It's a 50MW biomass power plant.
http://www.ccwe.net/
This plant has been running for more than 18 years. It's not denuded the landscape. It's not caused any forests to collapse. It's never burned tires. It's never burned garbage. For its entire history, the state Air Quality agency has monitored emissions at CCWE: It's got a clean, solid emissions record, superior to NC's average coal emissions in every respect. (This low air-pollution profile is no doubt due to the fact that the plant was originally built with emission controls that local coal-burners have resisted installing for more than 25 years.)
Privately owned forests in vicinity to CCWE are typically healthier than forests farther away. 125 people have jobs who may not be employed otherwise. The city where the plant is located, New Bern, NC, sells their urban wood debris (tree trimmings, chipped branches, storm debris, etc) to CCWE, saving taxpayers $100,000 last year.
http://www.newbernsj.com/news/city-44601-wood-plant.html
1) It provides baseload electricity, which displaces the need for 50MW of coal-fired power.
2) It consumes only waste biomass, most of which would otherwise emit CO2, methane and other greenhouse gases. (Despite what Jeff Gibbs writes, he is contradicted by soil scientists, forest ecologists, compost scientists, and landfill experts who have carefully quantified the GHG output of decomposing biomass materials.)
3) The tiny fraction of each tree that ends up at the biopower plant is more than offset by the massive trunk of the tree, which goes into pulp, paper, lumber, and other forest products.
4) Due to North Carolina's fertile climate, good rains, and best management practices, the forests surrounding CCWE re-grow new trees within a few years. Even when the land-owner chooses not to re-plant, there will be a new young forest in 10 years time.
5) The plant's clean wood ashes are applied to a local farmer's fields, reducing the soil's acidity, boosting fertility, and increasing still more up-take of CO2.
So tell me, what is it about this 18 year old plant that doesn't work?
Wood burning is not benign. Search "health hazards of wood smoke" to learn more. We're at the same ignorance level about the health and environmental hazards of wood smoke as we were 40 years ago about cigarette smoke. Environmental regulators know about these hazards and how wood smoke contributes to Clean Air Act compliance problems, but they're afraid of the political fallout of regulating residential wood smoke. It's as contentious an issue as gun control.
Outdoor wood boilers need to banned before we have a valley full of dead people. Remember Colorado in the 1970s? Valleys full of smoke led EPA to create woodstove standards, but it didn't include all wood-burning devices. NSPS is overdue for all solid-fuel heating devices. Black carbon (soot) from wood smoke is emerging as a major contributor to glacial melt. Start fixing the problem by changing your own actions. Don't put another log on the fire!
The most advanced technology will utilize gas turbines burning the syngas produced from pyrolosis. With the appropriate heat exchangers, thermal efficiencies of 75-80 percent can be achieved when the plant's waste heat is utilized for heating the ag waste processing plants, dairy barns or ethanol plants during winter months. In the summer, waste heat can be used for cooling when employed with chillers.
Economic expediance coupled to greenwash mania is driving us toward co-firing coal plants and wood power plants with our worlds precious forests. It is time to step back for a moment to examine the impact on our forests by going down this path and see what alternatives exist. I believe the pyrolosis path is a viable alternative if it focuses on organic waste that is returned to the land as biochar, is used primarly as a distributed energy source and wherever possible utilizes co-generation for maximum efficiency.
Burning wood in boilers to boil water to spin turbines and transmitting the power over long distance will never achieve and effciency above 23-25 percent. Therefore, it is an inefficient use of a precious resource that is doing a prefectly goog job of removing carbon from the atmosphere.
pyrolosis, with waste organic matter, is an acceptable form of electricity production because of the carbon sequestration associated with pyrolosis.
Changing the carbon cycle is an inherent process of pyrolosis with the production of biochar. There is nothing in nature that will breakdown biochar and release the carbon back into the atmosphere. This process goes beyond the concept of biomass being carbon neutral. Uitlizing municipal tree trimmings, trash, agriculture waste or anything oragnic as a pyrolosis fuel creates biochar.
From an agricultural perspective, the only crop that makes sense is Miscanthus Giganteus. It is a no till crop after the first year, it is non-invasive due to asexual propogation of rhizomes, it has low nutrient requirements, because most of the nutrients return to the rhizomes after the plant stops photosynthesizing in the fall, and it can be grown in less productive soils than corn or wheat thus making it a candidate to not displace food for fuel.
The electricity could be utilized locally to power the farms energy needs, eliminate most of the runoff into the bay and create biochar to be spread on the local farm land as a soil amendment.
Biochar helps soil retain moisture and stimulates soil micro organisms to release more nutrients.
This would be a win/win proposition for the economics and environment of the region.
Municipal landfills would be another perfect target for this technology. Although some landfills are producing electricity from methane gas emissions, most are not. No landfills that I am aware of are employing pyrolosis to reduce the amount of oranic waste entering the landfills. Consequently, pyrolosis biomass power plants could not only slow the rise of the landfills, but it could also burn the methane being produced from respiration of the buried organic matter.
The biomass waste generated at ethanol plants could be an additonal source of power for the ethanol plants which would increase the efficiency of the plants especially when they are utilizing cellulosic ethanol. Beer breweries have similar waste and power needs.