Agro Fossil Free - Systematic assessment of the availability and utilization potential of biomass in Bangladesh

Descripción general

Following the global trend of industrial growth, Bangladesh aims towards significant industrial expansion, which is associated with increased energy consumption. Current energy generation in Bangladesh is highly dependent on fossil fuels. However, increasing energy demands, stringent regulations on fossil fuel-based emissions, and concerns related to national energy-security make it imperative to search for alternative energy sources. Biomass-based renewable sources, such as wood, agricultural residues, municipal solid wastes are attractive alternatives to petroleum-based feedstocks for energy and chemicals. Although biomass shows great potential, limited systematic studies exist on biomass as a feedstock in Bangladesh. In this work, we present an overall assessment of the availability and utilization potentials of different biomass resources. A novel feature is the quantitative assessment of major biomass resources, which are unconventional and were previously ignored. It is estimated that the total available biomass from agriculture, waste, industries, animals and other sources could generate more than 3447 petajoules (>950 TWh) of energy, which is three times of the current fossils fuel based-energy consumption in Bangladesh. This means that even if only one-third of the overall biomass is utilized for energy generation, it would meet the total energy demand in Bangladesh without utilizing fossil fuels and other sources. A systematic pathway from utilizable biomass to useful chemicals is also presented towards industrial utilization of biomass. This study presents a realistic assessment of available biomass as a prominent source of useful energy and chemicals, and insinuates the potential to be the sustainable source of primary energy that can eventually replace the fossil fuels in the long term.