Smart production of biofuel for small communities

A Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) of Bio-waste Gasification as part of a techno-economic feasibility for establishing a small scale production facility for processing bio-waste into liquid fuels is presented in this paper. It is well known that transport sector is a big consumer of fossil fuels. Different bio-fuels are potential candidates to replace to petroleum based fuels in automobiles without requiring major changes to the engine. Biofuels can also be produced from various biomass including bio-waste from domestic and industrial sectors. The size and type of the gasification plants depend on demand and available feedstock. Thus for small and sparse communities such as Narvik, setting up a plant is not considered to be economical. This paper investigates the viability of a small plant to produce fuels to meet the demand of public transport in the region. The plant was sized based on the amount of biomass produced annually from the forests and municipal bio- waste (MBW). The annually available amounts of biomass from forests and MBW for treatment to produce biodiesel were estimated. For this scenario, a downdraft gasifier of 6.0 MW was considered adequate. Current annual demand of diesel for public transport buses in Narvik was also estimated. It was found out that only 28% of the estimated biodiesel product will be sufficient for running the public transport busses in Narvik. Therefore the plant can supply fuel for other applications. Cost analysis included estimations of capital, operational and maintenance (O&M) costs for the biomass pre-treatment processes, the gasification plant and the gas to liquid (GTL) plant is fully discussed. It was concluded that the payback period can be achieved within four years. The study demonstrated that small to medium size gasification plants can fulfil energy demand locally utilising local biomass feedstock and contribute towards environmental targets.