Skip to main content

KDF Search Results

Displaying 1 - 20 of 25

Contact information about the submitter of this metadata record:
Author list: Maggie Davis, Matt Langholtz, Laurence Eaton, Chad Hellwinkel
Who should be contacted with questions relating to the data? (Principal investigator or primary developer of data product): Maggie Davis, davismr@ornl.gov

Organization:
DOE
Author(s):
Maggie Davis , Matt Langholtz , Laurence Eaton , Chad Hellwinkel
Funded from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Bioenergy Technologies Office.

This paper analyzes the rural Chinese biomass supply system and models supply chain operations according to U.S. concepts of logistical unit operations: harvest and collection, storage, transportation, preprocessing, and handling and queuing. In this paper, we quantify the logistics cost of corn stover and sweet sorghum in China under different scenarios. We analyze three scenarios of corn stover logistics from northeast China and three scenarios of sweet sorghum stalks logistics from Inner Mongolia in China.

Author(s):
Lantian Ren, Kara Cafferty, Mohammad Ron, Jacob Jacobson, Guanghui Xie, Leslie Ovard, and Christopher Wright
Funded from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Bioenergy Technologies Office.

Harvesting of corn stover (plant residues) for cellulosic ethanol production must be balanced with the requirement for returning plant residues to agricultural fields to maintain soil structure, fertility, crop protection, and other ecosystem services. High rates of corn stover removal can be associated with decreased soil organic matter (SOM) quantity and quality and increased highly erodible soil aggregate fractions.

Author(s):
R. Michael Lehman , Thomas F. Ducey , Virginia L. Jin , Veronica Acosta-Martinez , Carla M. Ahlschwede , Elizabeth S. Jeske , Rhae A. Drijber , Keri B. Cantrell , James R. Frederick , Darci M. Fink , Shannon L. Osborne , Jeff M. Novak , Jane M. F. Johnson , Gary E. Varvel

In-field measurements of direct soil greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions provide critical data for quantifying the net energy efficiency and economic feasibility of crop residue-based bioenergy production systems. A major challenge to such assessments has been the paucity of field studies addressing the effects of crop residue removal and associated best practices for soil management (i.e., conservation tillage) on soil emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O), and methane (CH4).

Author(s):
Virginia L. Jin , John M. Baker , Jane M.-F. Johnson , Douglas L. Karlen , R. Michael Lehman , Shannon L. Osborne , Thomas J. Sauer , Diane E. Stott , Gary E. Varvel , Rodney T. Venterea , Marty R. Schmer , Brian J. Wienhold

Harvesting crop residue needs to be managed to protect agroecosystem health and productivity. DAYCENT, a process-based modeling tool, may be suited to accommodate region-specific factors and provide regional predictions for a broad array of agroecosystem impacts associated with corn stover harvest. Grain yield, soil C, and N2O emission data collected at Corn Stover Regional Partnership experimental sites were used to test DAYCENT performance modeling the impacts of corn stover removal.

Author(s):
Eleanor E. Campbell , Jane M. F. Johnson , Virginia L. Jin , R. Michael Lehman , Shannon L. Osborne , Gary E. Varvel , Keith Paustian

Corn stover is targeted as a potential non-food bioenergy feedstock, especially in the Midwest United States.  Three parallel experiments on adjacent fields, one is managed without tillage since 1995, a second experiment is managed without tillage since 2005, and the third is managed with chisel plowing since 2005.  The residue removal treatments are the same in all experiments, with 0, 50%, 75% and 100% of the rows from plots in the corn phase of the rotation harvested. In 2008, the 75% stover removal was changed to cob removal.

Author(s):
Jane M. Johnson , Nancy Barbour

The harvest of corn stover or herbaceous crops as feedstocks for bioenergy purposes has been shown to have significant benefits from energy and climate change perspectives. There is a potential, however, to adversely impact water and soil quality, especially in Midwestern states where the biomass feedstock production would predominantly occur.

Author(s):
Nelson, Richard

National interests in greater energy independence, concurrent with favorable market forces, have driven increased production of corn-based ethanol in the United States and research into the next generation of biofuels. The trend is changing the national agricultural landscape and has raised concerns about potential impacts on the nation?s water resources. This report examines some of the key issues and identifies opportunities for shaping policies that help to protect water resources.

Author(s):
Schnoor, Jerald

Power generation emits significant amounts of greenhouse gases (GHGs), mainly carbon dioxide (CO2). Sequestering CO2 from the power plant flue gas can significantly reduce the GHGs from the power plant itself, but this is not the total picture. CO2 capture and sequestration consumes additional energy, thus lowering the plant's fuel-to-electricity efficiency. To compensate for this, more fossil fuel must be procured and consumed to make up for lost capacity.

Author(s):
Spath, Pam

Biomass is a significant contributor to the US economy--agriculture, forest and paper products, food and related products account for 5% of our GDP. While the forest products industry self generates some of their energy, other sectors are importers. Bioenergy can contribute to economic development and to the environment. Examples of bioenergy routes suggest that atmospheric carbon can be cycled through biofuels in carefully designed systems for sustainability. Significant potential exists for these options.

Author(s):
Costello, Raymond

The Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007 established specific targets for the production of biofuel in the United States. Until advanced technologies become commercially viable, meeting these targets will increase demand for traditional agricultural commodities used to produce ethanol, resulting in land-use, production, and price changes throughout the farm sector. This report summarizes the estimated effects of meeting the EISA targets for 2015 on regional agricultural production and the environment. Meeting EISA targets for ethanol production is estimated to expand U.S.

Author(s):
Malcolm, Scott A.

This paper examines the impact of biofuel expansion on grain utilization and distribution at the state and cropping district level as most of grain producers and handlers are directly influenced by the local changes. We conducted a survey to understand the utilization and flows of corn, ethanol and its co-products, such as dried distillers grains (DDG) in Iowa. Results suggest that the rapidly expanding ethanol industry has a significant impact on corn utilization in Iowa.

Author(s):
Yu, Tun-Hsiang (Edward)

This paper introduces a spatial bioeconomic model for study of potential cellulosic biomass supply at regional scale. By modeling the profitability of alternative crop production practices, it captures the opportunity cost of replacing current crops by cellulosic biomass crops. The model draws upon biophysical crop input-output coefficients, price and cost data, and spatial transportation costs in the context of profit maximization theory. Yields are simulated using temperature, precipitation and soil quality data with various commercial crops and potential new cellulosic biomass crops.

Author(s):
Egbendewe-Mondzozo, Aklesso

In the corn ethanol industry, the ability of plants to obtain favorable prices through marketing decisions is considered important for their overall economic performance. Based on a panel of surveyed of ethanol plants we extend data envelopment analysis (DEA) to decompose the economic efficiency of plants into conventional sources (technical and allocative efficiency) and a new component we call marketing efficiency.

Author(s):
Sesmero, Juan S.

Transgenic modification of plants is a key enabling technology for developing sustainable biofeedstocks for biofuels production. Regulatory decisions and the wider acceptance and development of transgenic biofeedstock crops are considered from the context of science-based risk assessment. The risk assessment paradigm for transgenic biofeedstock crops is fundamentally no different from that of current generation transgenic crops, except that the focus of the assessment must consider the unique attributes of a given biofeedstock crop and its environmental release.

Author(s):
Wolt, Jeffrey D.

Soaring global food prices are threatening to push more poor people back below the poverty line; this will probably become aggravated by the serious challenge that increasing population and climate changes are posing for food security. There is growing evidence that human activities involving fossil fuel consumption and land use are contributing to greenhouse gas emissions and consequently changing the climate worldwide. The finite nature of fossil fuel reserves is causing concern about energy security and there is a growing interest in the use of renewable energy sources such as biofuels.

Author(s):
Acosta, O.

The rapidly expanding biofuel industry has changed the fundamentals of U.S. agricultural commodity markets. Increasing ethanol and biodiesel production has generated a fast-growing demand for corn and soybean products, which competes with the well-established domestic livestock industry and foreign buyers. Meanwhile, the co-products of biofuel production are replacing or displacing coarse grains and oilseed meal in feed rations for livestock.

Author(s):
Tun-Hsiang (Edward) Yu

Prior studies have estimated that a liter of bioethanol requires 263−784 L of water from corn farm to fuel pump, but these estimates have failed to account for the widely varied regional irrigation practices. By using regional time-series agricultural and ethanol production data in the U.S., this paper estimates the state-level field-to-pump water requirement of bioethanol across the nation. The results indicate that bioethanol’s water requirements can range from 5 to 2138 L per liter of ethanol depending on regional irrigation practices.

Author(s):
Yi-Wen Chiu

There is a strong societal need to evaluate and understand the sustainability of biofuels, especially because of the significant increases in production mandated by many countries, including the United States. Sustainability will be a strong factor in the regulatory environment and investments in biofuels. Biomass feedstock production is an important contributor to environmental, social, and economic impacts from biofuels.

Author(s):
Gayathri Gopalakrishnan