Indonesian state power company to run 114 power plants on biofuels
In an effort to reduce its dependence on expsensive oil, beginning next year Indonesia's state-owned power firm Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) will start using locally produced biofuel to fire 114 small- and medium-scale power plants around the country. PLN chief commissioner Alhilal Hamdi said in Jakarta that the plan had been approved following the success of pilot projects for the use of biofuel in an 11 MW plant in Lampung and a 1.5 MW power plant in Nusa Penida, Bali, earlier this year. "Next year, we will start using biofuel in West Nusa Tenggara, East Nusa Tenggara and South Kalimantan," said Alhilal.
In 2004, PLN generated some 120 TWh of electricity, serving 31,000 households and 2200 businesses and large industries. The bulk of its power is generated from oil, coal and natural gas (see graph).
Pure plant oil
Unlike other power companies who are increasingly using solid biomass (agricultural and forestry) to fuel their electricity generating plants, PLN relies on pure plant oil (PPO). On the sidelines of a media gathering to promote the use of PPO for power generation, Alilhal, who is also the head of the Indonesian government's biofuel development committee, explained the rationale behind it. PPO, made from palm oil, is being used to fire the Lampung power plant. He said that power generated by this plant, which used a blend made up of 80% PPO and 20% diesel, was 300 rupiah (3 US$ cents) per KWh, a third below the average cost of electricity produced from oil-based fuels.
"We hope we can save more using this alternative energy source, and therefore help reduce the government's subvention," Alhilal said. According to a review conducted by the State Ministry for Research and Technology's technological assessment and application agency (BPPT), the government could cut the subsidies it pays to PLN to 2.56 trillion rupiahs per year if greater use were made of PPO. In addition, PPO, which can also be blended with kerosene, could cut the amount the government has to pay on the kerosene subsidy to 1.66 trillion rupiahs per year, the review says.
Unggul Priyanto of the BPPT said that the use of PPO would work out much cheaper than diesel or even biodiesel. "The price of diesel and biodiesel for industrial use stands at about 6,000 rupiah per 1000 liters, while palm oil-based PPO is only 4,300 rupiah. This is why the greater use of PPO could save a lot of money," he said:
bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: palm oil :: jatropha :: pure plant oil :: biodiesel :: power generation :: electricity :: Indonesia ::
He explained that the cost of PPO was lower as it used nothing except pure vegetable oils, either palm or jathropa oil, without the need for an additional processes or chemical additives, unlike in the case of biodiesel, which required the addition of methanol and glycerin.
Commenting on the question of whether PPO or biodiesel was preferable, Alhilal said that both were alternative energy sources that had important roles to play in helping the country overcome its dependence on oil.
In September, as part of its bioenergy crash program (earlier post) the government pledged to allocate nearly 500,000 hectares of land next year to encourage the development of the country's fledgling biofuel industry.
Article continues
In 2004, PLN generated some 120 TWh of electricity, serving 31,000 households and 2200 businesses and large industries. The bulk of its power is generated from oil, coal and natural gas (see graph).
Pure plant oil
Unlike other power companies who are increasingly using solid biomass (agricultural and forestry) to fuel their electricity generating plants, PLN relies on pure plant oil (PPO). On the sidelines of a media gathering to promote the use of PPO for power generation, Alilhal, who is also the head of the Indonesian government's biofuel development committee, explained the rationale behind it. PPO, made from palm oil, is being used to fire the Lampung power plant. He said that power generated by this plant, which used a blend made up of 80% PPO and 20% diesel, was 300 rupiah (3 US$ cents) per KWh, a third below the average cost of electricity produced from oil-based fuels.
"We hope we can save more using this alternative energy source, and therefore help reduce the government's subvention," Alhilal said. According to a review conducted by the State Ministry for Research and Technology's technological assessment and application agency (BPPT), the government could cut the subsidies it pays to PLN to 2.56 trillion rupiahs per year if greater use were made of PPO. In addition, PPO, which can also be blended with kerosene, could cut the amount the government has to pay on the kerosene subsidy to 1.66 trillion rupiahs per year, the review says.
Unggul Priyanto of the BPPT said that the use of PPO would work out much cheaper than diesel or even biodiesel. "The price of diesel and biodiesel for industrial use stands at about 6,000 rupiah per 1000 liters, while palm oil-based PPO is only 4,300 rupiah. This is why the greater use of PPO could save a lot of money," he said:
bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: palm oil :: jatropha :: pure plant oil :: biodiesel :: power generation :: electricity :: Indonesia ::
He explained that the cost of PPO was lower as it used nothing except pure vegetable oils, either palm or jathropa oil, without the need for an additional processes or chemical additives, unlike in the case of biodiesel, which required the addition of methanol and glycerin.
Commenting on the question of whether PPO or biodiesel was preferable, Alhilal said that both were alternative energy sources that had important roles to play in helping the country overcome its dependence on oil.
In September, as part of its bioenergy crash program (earlier post) the government pledged to allocate nearly 500,000 hectares of land next year to encourage the development of the country's fledgling biofuel industry.
Article continues
Saturday, December 02, 2006
Japanese company to produce ethanol from oil palm waste
However, this 'waste' biomass can be converted into liquid fuels instead of being burned as solid biomass in power plants (or as a feedstock for the production of biogas). Several conversion paths are possible for the production of transport fuels: thermochemical conversion (gasification after which the gas is turned into a 'synthetic' biodiesel via the Fischer-Tropsch process) or biochemical conversion, whereby specially designed enzymes break down the cellulose contained in the biomass to release sugars that can be fermented into ethanol. So besides yielding some 5000 to 7000 liters of biodiesel, the African oil palm's waste stream can be used to produce a vast quantity of ('second generation') ethanol or synfuel.
The reason why we come back to this earlier article is simple: a Japanese company has meanwhile decided to conduct an economic feasibility study on the idea. Interested in utilising the enormous agricultural waste stream generated by the oil palm industry in Malaysia to produce cellulosic ethanol, Mitsui Engineering recently sent an investment team to the country to undertake research scheduled to be completed early next year.
The company's spokesman told a local newspaper: "If found feasible, we will build a pilot plant costing about 3 million US dollars by networking with a local partner from the oil palm sector for the commercial production of bio-ethanol." Mitsui plans to build the pilot in the next two years and commence testing and trial operation by 2010, added the spokesman.
He noted that the development and commercial production of biofuel from oil palm in Malaysia has so far focused on biodiesel only, which is suitable for diesel engines but not applicable to petrol-powered vehicles: "When demand for biodiesel sharply increases, the use of palm oil for biofuel could constitute a competition with its current use mainly in the food industry," he said. The extraction of bioethanol from oil palm wastes can do away with such worries, said the spokesman, adding that the conversion efficiency of turning waste palm trunk fibres into ethanol is around 30%:
ethanol :: biodiesel :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: oil palm :: waste :: biomass :: cellulose :: cellulosic ethanol :: Malaysia ::
In Malaysia, a huge quantity of felled old oil palm trunks are discarded during replanting. An oil palm plant has a productive life of about 25 years, after which it is felled and replaced by new seedlings. Some 4% of the total palm hectarage in Malaysia is replaced this way, each year, amounting to anywhere between 12 and 16 million tonnes of cellulose-rich biomass from trunks alone. Add some 80 million tonnes of biomass from fruit bunches, fronds, press cake and kernels that is generated each year.
The organic constituents of these different types of biomass vary, with some being richer in cellulose than others. But most of them contain more than 50% of easily extractable cellulose and less than 30% of lignin. At an average conversion efficiency of 30% applied to this stream of cellulose-rich biomass, it is not difficult to see that this waste resource holds considerable potential for the production of cellulosic ethanol. The numbers are for Malaysia only. Indonesia, which will surpass Malaysia's palm hectarage next year, has an even larger unused feedstock resource.
The study we are currently preparing deals with the technical potential and energy balance of next-generation liquid biofuels made from tropical and sub-tropical crops and residues only. But the news that a company is already studying the matter from an investment perspective, is an incentive for us to go beyond the technical potential and to study the economic potential as well (in a follow-up). We are looking forward to news on Mitsui's feasibility study, and as soon as it arrives, we will report back on it.
New revenues, less deforestation
The news is important from an environmental perspective as well. The palm oil industry in South East Asia is rightly criticized for driving deforestation. The industry itself is trying to counteract some of the critiques by stressing its investments in crop improvement research and in focusing on getting smallholders to replace old trees with new, high-yielding varieties so that less land and forest has to be converted into plantations.
Now if the biofuel industry in this part of the world were to start utilising the vast amount of unused 'waste' biomass for the production of ethanol, an entirely new revenue stream would emerge, both for smallholders and large estates. This would greatly reduce the stress on forests, which is most often driven by the smaller plantation owners who prefer to convert forest into new land, because they're poor. Unlike large estates who can invest in new palm varieties, in the best plantation management practises and even in downstream sectors, smallholders often only have the single worst option before them: cutting down trees to plant more low-yielding palms.
Article continues
posted by Biopact team at 9:15 PM 0 comments links to this post