Sunday, May 3, 2009
8-09

Potential cost saving strategies for storage of wet biomass feedstocks

Mark Delwiche, Biosciences, Idaho National Laboratory, 2525 North Fremont St., Idaho Falls, ID 83415-2203, Allison Ray, Biomass storage, Idaho National Laboratory, 2525 North Fremont St., Idaho Falls, ID 83415, and William A. Smith, Biological Systems Department, Idaho National Laboratory, P.O. Box 1625, Idaho Falls, ID 83415-2203.

Large quantities of wet agricultural residue feedstock are available for biofuel production, but storage, transportation, and handling costs are prohibitively large.  Some potential exists for deriving cost savings through recovery of co-products produced in wet stored feedstocks.  And additional savings may be realized as by-products of co-product recovery.  This work describes a basic storage cost model and describes laboratory studies that evaluate potential for co-product production in storage.  Co-product cost offset estimates based on laboratory results are presented, opportunities for transportation and handling cost savings derived from processing are described, and these potential savings are incorporated into the storage cost model.  The analysis suggests wet feedstocks may be competitive with dry cellulosic materials depending on compositional, environmental, and scaling factors.