LCA of burning different solid biomass substrates

Biomass from agriculture, crop residues, forestry, landscape management, and wastes from industry and households can be used for energy recovery. In a project commissioned by the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE), a life cycle assessment (LCA) of the direct combustion of different non-wood
biomass substrates was performed. Based on the overview of potential biomass substrates for combustion and the availability of data, life cycle inventory data for burning the following five substrates are collected: olive dry pomace, coffee ground pellets, horse dung & wood chips co-combustion, poultry litter pellets and slurry solids & wood chips co-combustion.

The life cycle impact assessment shows that the combustion of the biomass substrates has the highest environmental impact, followed by the disposal of the ash generated by the combustion process. In general the biomass substrates perform worse compared to the combustion of wood from an environmental point of view. The burning of biomass substrates generates higher particulate and nitrogen oxide emissions than the combustion of wood or wood pellets. The combustion of coffee ground pellets, poultry litter pellets and horse dung mixed with wood chips show similar environmental impacts as the combustion of wood logs in a small furnace.

The results were presented during the 47th Discussion Forum in April 2012.

Datasets in XML-format are available for download here.