Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533

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Biomass and Bioenergy

journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/biombioe

Research paper

Agricultural and agro-industrial residues-to-energy: Techno-

economic and environmental assessment in Brazil
Joana Portugal-Pereira*, Rafael Soria, Re

gis Rathmann, Roberto Schaeffer, Alexandre Szklo
Energy Planning Program, Graduate School of Engineering, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Centro de Tecnologia, Bloco C, Sala 211, Cidade

ria, Ilha do Funda
Universita ~o, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study aims to quantify the environmentally sustainable and economically feasible potentials of
Received 20 October 2014 agricultural and agro-industrial residues to generate electricity via direct combustion in centralised
Received in revised form power plants in Brazil. Further, the energy savings and greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction potential of
30 June 2015
replacing natural gas-based electricity by bioenergy have been assessed. To this end, a methodology has
Accepted 7 August 2015
Available online 27 August 2015
been developed based on an integrated evaluation, incorporating statistical and geographical informa-
tion system (GIS)-based analysis, and a life-cycle-assessment approach. Results reveal that the envi-
ronmentally sustainable generation potential is nearly 141 TWh/year, mainly concentrated in the South,
Keywords:
Bioenergy
Southeast, and Midwest regions of the country. Sugarcane, soybean and maize crop residues are the
Agricultural residues major feedstocks for available bioenergy. On the other hand, the economic potential is far lower, ac-
GIS mapping counting to 39 TWh/year. The total GHG mitigation is nearly 18 million tonne CO2e and could reach 64
Life cycle assessment million tonne CO2e yearly, if the technical potential is considered. The gap between technical and eco-
Climate change mitigation nomic potentials implies that constraints to bioenergy are not related to a lack of resources, but rather
Brazil associated to economic, logistical, regulatory and political barriers.
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The Brazilian power sector is on a knife-edge. Historically, the
country has been a World leader on renewable energy, with the
share of hydropower and bioelectricity making up approximately
79% of the country's power generation portfolio in 2013 [1]. How-
ever, year after year, this contribution has been decreasing. On the
one hand, on the demand side, in the last decade, electricity con-
sumption increased two-fold up to 516 TWh/year, partly due to the
rising quality of life of an emerging middle-class. On the other
hand, on the supply side, the expansion of hydropower plant pro-
jects has been limited due to socio-environmental restrictions [2,3].
Accordingly, the Brazilian government has announced that the
expansion of large reservoir hydropower facilities will be con-
strained after 2025e30 [4]. Reservoir hydro systems are equipped
* Corresponding author. Energy Planning Program, COPPE, Universidade Federal
do Rio de Janeiro, Centro de Tecnologia, Sala C-211, C.P. 68565, Cidade Universit

aria,
Ilha do Funda ~o, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil.
E-mail addresses: portugal.pereira@ppe.ufrj.br, joanaportugal@gmail.com
(J. Portugal-Pereira).
with water storage facilities in order to control the water sent to
turbines, allowing a variation in the amount of generated power.
Although these systems are particularly capable to handle peak
electricity loads, they raise environmental conflicts and social
concerns, especially in the Amazon basin and other environmen-
tally sensible ecosystems. Future projects might, therefore, be
limited to run-of-the-river technologies, which imply reduced
water flooding and limited environmental impacts. In these sys-
tems, water is streamed without a reservoir to a pipe that supplies
the water turbine and then flows freely downstream. While these
systems have low ecological and climate footprint, run-of-the-river
technologies have limited capacity to provide firm energy to the
grid as the power generation oscillates considerably and is very
much vulnerable to weather conditions [5].
The capacity of water storage in the dam reservoirs has been
steadily decreasing since 2008 (Fig. 1) [6]. Aggravating the situa-
tion, the country is facing a serious drought, which, as of April 2015,
reduced water level in reservoirs to an average of 31% of their total
storage capacity, highlighting the vulnerability of the country to-
wards extreme weather events [7,8]. The autonomy of hydropower
systems, expressed as the number of months that hydropower
plants can supply the country's power demand excluding the

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biombioe.2015.08.010
0961-9534/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
522 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533
Fig. 1. Regulation capacity of hydropower reservoirs in Brazil.
Source: Own elaboration, based on [6].
dispatch of thermal power plants, has been decreasing sharply to
historically low levels. While in late 1990's the water available in
country's reservoirs had capacity to supply firm power equivalent
to consumption needs for about four months, as of beginning of
2015 water in reservoirs only guaranteed supply up to one month of
demand.
Forecasts predict that electricity consumption will double from
2010 levels to 1100 TWh in 2035 [9]. Following a business-as-usual
scenario, this growth will partly be met with fossil fuel resources
[10]. In recent years, the Brazilian government has announced
aggressive investments to explore pre-salt oil and gas reserves and
even unconventional natural gas (shale and tight). This is seen as a
strategy to increase the energy security of supply, and to foster the
resilience and resource diversification of the power supply sector in
particular [11]. Paradoxically, in global terms, increasing the share
of fossil fuels in the electricity generation portfolio results in higher
GHG emissions, with the possible consequence of inducing more
severe weather events, which indirectly intensifies the vulnera-
bility of hydropower systems. Thus, the country is currently trap-
ped in a development vicious cycle.
Recent attention has been put on bioelectricity, as a feasible
alternative to turn this tendency into a virtuous cycle. It would
simultaneously diversify energy sources [12], reduce fossil-fuel
dependence [13,14], and tackle climate change [15,16]. Although
traditional, dedicated biomass has already a significant expression
in the country's power supply, particularly based on sugarcane
bagasse thermal power plants [17e20], there is a vast potential
from agricultural and agro-industrial residues which are currently
not recovered. Instead of being left on the farmland and slowly
decomposed (aerobically on the field, or anaerobically in landfills or
common garbage dumps), releasing GHG emissions, this valuable
feedstock could be collected and processed to generate electricity
via conventional thermochemical processes. Assessing the bio-
energy potential is, therefore, essential to characterise feedstocks
both qualitatively and quantitatively and to prospect the potential
substitution of fossil fuels and the associated reduction in GHG
emissions.
A small number of studies can be found in the literature that
touches this subject. At the national level, the technical potential
for electricity generation from major agricultural crop residues and
animal manure has been estimated [21,22]. In more detail, other
assessments quantified the energy potentials of the main biomass
resources in different regions of Brazil [23e26]. A common limi-
tation of these studies is the reliance on crude assumptions and
simple national statistics to quantify the potential of residue pro-
duction, disregarding the economic and environmental limitations
of residue collection and processing. Furthermore, previous studies
are restricted to a specific area in the country or to a particular
technology. Another downside is the lack of georeferenced statis-
tical data in the bioenergy potential estimations. As highlighted by
[27], data about spatial distribution of biomass are needed to
optimise the efficient use of resources.
Aiming at overcoming this gap, this study attempts to estimate
the technical, environmentally sustainable and economic feasible
potentials of agricultural and agro-industrial residues to generate
electricity via direct combustion in centralised systems in Brazil.
Further, it applies an integrated geographic information system
(GIS)-based analysis to map residue availability and assesses how
much bioenergy can replace fossil fuel resources and contribute to a
reduction in GHG emissions. To this end, a statistical analysis has
been conducted, followed by a GIS mapping, which identifies
optimal locations for bioenergy generation centres, under techno-
economic and environmental constraints. Then, a life-cycle
approach has been undertaken to quantify the non-renewable
energy and GHG emission savings from replacing fossil-fuel-
based electricity.
This paper is structured as follows. Section 2 presents the in-
tegrated assessment applied in the study, including key theoretical
principles about analytical quantification of bioenergy with a sta-
tistical based approach and GIS mapping, as well as assumptions
applied in the environmental assessment. This is followed by Sec-
tion 3, which discusses key results, lessons learnt and limitation of
the study. Lastly, Section 4 outlines final remarks and implications
of the study to policy making.
 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533
2. Materials and methods
This study adopts a resource-based assessment that takes into
account the main characteristics of biomass feedstocks (Section 2.1)
to estimate the technical, environmentally sustainable and eco-
nomic potentials for centralised electricity generation via direct
combustion in isolated systems (Section 2.2.1). Then, resources
have been mapped with a GIS tool, considering logistic and eco-
nomic limitations, in order to estimate an indicator of economic
bioenergy potential in rural areas in Brazil in terms of kWh/
year km2 (Section 2.2.2). Lastly, a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has
been conducted to evaluate fossil fuel savings and GHG reductions
of substituting fossil-fuel-based electricity by bioelectricity (Sec-
tion 2.3).
2.1. Feedstock characterisation
Brazil, one of the World's major agricultural producers [28],
generates significant amounts of biomass residues in activities
arising from harvesting and processing of agricultural products,
such as rice, cotton, sugarcane, corn, soybeans, among others.
Agricultural waste comes from the agricultural phase of the culti-
vation of certain species, while agro-industrial residues result from
the industrial processing of biomass.
Much of the agricultural crops produced in Brazil are covered in
this work. Among the most important crops, in terms of the po-
tential for use of residues, one can cite sugarcane, maize and soy-
beans [28].
Three different solid residues are produced from sugarcane
processing: straw (during farming), bagasse and filter cake (in the
processing of ethanol). Currently, the main source of agro-
electricity in Brazil is sugarcane bagasse (operating capacity of
9.4 GW), due to the large sugarcane production for ethanol and
sugar, and consequent production of this residue in sugar mills and
ethanol distilleries [29e31]. It is noteworthy that, recently, other
agricultural and industrial sugarcane residues have been widely
studied for power generation. Brazil already has in operation a
considerable number of biomass power plants running on different
feedstocks beyond sugarcane bagasse, for example: black liquor
(1.7 GW), wood residues (371 MW), biogas (85 MW), rice husk
(36 MW), charcoal (35 MW), elephant grass (32 MW) and palm oil
(4 MW) [29].
Agricultural residues generated in the maize harvest, which are
usually left in the field, are cobs, stalks and stems (culms) and stove.
In this study, we considered only stove for the purpose of energy
use, with low heating value (LHV), moisture content, residue-to-
product ratio (RPR), availability of residues and annual availability
factor shown in Table 1.
During the harvest of soybean, the same residues as the maize
crop, which are stalks, stems, and leaves, commonly called soybean
straw, are produced. The harvester reaps the grain in the field and
discards these residues. During processing, products of higher
value added, such as bran and soybean oil, are generated. Due to the
waste and by-products of soybean for food and feed supplemen-
tation competition, only straw from the harvest of soybeans was
considered as a residue.
2.2. Waste-to-energy potential
2.2.1. Statistical quantification of agricultural and agro-industrial
residues
Bioenergy potential is constrained by the theoretical capacity of
biomass production, its environmental impacts, and techno-
economic viability [27,28]. The theoretical capacity defines the
maximum available bioenergy under biophysical and agro-
523
ecological conditions that hold down the growth of crops and
residues, such as temperature, solar radiation, rainfall, and soil
properties. This potential is albeit limited by environmental con-
straints, as agricultural residues are important biome regulators. As
described by [53], residues create a buffer that mitigate impacts of
rain and wind erosion agents, and also protect soil from excessive
sunlight and evaporation. Furthermore, several studies ([54,55])
suggest that agricultural residues contribute to nutrient recycling
and organic matter fixation, and support microbial and macro
invertebrate activity. The techno-economic viability, on the other
hand, refers to the fraction of the environmentally sustainable
potential available under technological possibilities, logistic re-
strictions, and takes into account competition of other non-energy
uses of residues. Fig. 2 lays out the schematic difference between
the biomass potentials under evaluation. In this study, the theo-
retical, geographic and technical potentials were implicitly quan-
tified, while the environmentally sustainable and economic
potentials are presented in the following sections.
Considering the techno-economic and environmental con-
straints described above, this study follows a bottom-up statistical
analysis to determine the environmentally sustainable and techno-
economic feasible potentials of bioenergy from agricultural resi-
dues as follows:
X 
RPj ¼ Ai :Pi :RPRj;i :ESRj :ARj :LHVj :h = 3:6 = 106 (1)
where:
RPj: agricultural residue potential (GWh/year)
Ai: agricultural area of crop i (ha/year)
Pi: productivity of crop i (tonne/ha)
RPRj,i: residue of j to product i ratio (#) (see Table 1)
ESRj: environmentally sustainable removal rate of residue j (%)
ARj: availability rate of residue j (%) (see Table 1)
LHVj: low heating value of residue j (MJ/kg) (see Table 1)
h: conversion energy efficiency of standalone biomass Rankine
power plant (18%LHV) [21].
Similarly, the potential of bioelectricity from agro-industrial
residues has been evaluated as follows:
X
RPk ¼ ðAi :Pi :ARk :LHVk Þ:h = 3:6 = 106 (2)
where:
RPk: agro-industrial residue potential (GWh/year)
Ai: agricultural area of crop i (ha/year)
Pi: productivity of crop i (tonne/ha)
ARk: availability rate of residue k (%) (see Table 1)
LHVk: low heating value of residue k (MJ/kg) (see Table 1)
h: conversion energy efficiency of standalone biomass Rankine
power plant (18%LHV) [21].
Data regarding agricultural harvest area (Ai) and crop yields
(Pi) have been collected in national database sets, available from
the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), under
the Municipal Agricultural Survey (PAM) for all Brazilian munic-
ipalities (5565 in total, according to the political division of 2010)
in the baseline year 2010 [58]. The biophysical and agro-ecological
limitations of residue generation, expressed as the ratio of residue
generated per product (RPRi) derive from the literature, as shown
in Table 1. Nonetheless it should be underlined that residue yield
varies locally with agricultural practices, climatic conditions and
crop yields. As discussed in [59], empirical evidences suggest that
524 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533

Table 1
Characterisation of evaluated residues.

Resource Residue LHVa (MJ/ Moisture contentb (wdb/ Residue-to-product ratio Availability of residues (wdb/ Annual availability factor
kg) wdb%) (RPR)c wdb%)d (%)f

Sugarcane Straw 18.62 6.00 0.22 65 50

Bagasse 19.81 10.39 0.22 10 50
Filter cake 19.81 10.39 0.02 10 50
Rice Straw 17.22 8.63 1.54 100 50
Husk 17.08 10.00 0.26 30e 50
Soybean Straw 20.09 14.00 2.01 100 40
Cotton Straw 20.10 14.00 2.81 100 25
Cassava Peels and tops 20.09 14.00 1.11 100 50
Peanut Straw 20.10 14.00 2.52 100 33
Shell and husk 18.98 7.99 0.56 70 33
Coffee Husk 19.39 10.75 0.59 50 58
Coconut Husk 21.50 8.10 0.84 90 100
Shell 20.09 14.00 0.42 90 100
Palm oil Shell 15.54 7.99 0.06 80 100
Fibres 15.62 7.99 0.12 80 100
Empty fruit 15.17 12.00 0.20 100 100
bunches
Bean Stems and leaves 14.33 9.00 1.45 30 50
Rye Straw 20.08 8.20 1.61 100 25
Barley Straw 19.68 8.81 1.48 100 25
Corn Stover 18.67 5.65 1.53 100 50
Sorghum Straw 19.06 7.04 1.90 100 25
Oat Straw 19.58 12.32 1.54 100 25
Wheat Straw 19.54 11.24 1.55 100 33
a
LHV of residues has been estimated based on the High Heating Value (HHV) proposed by [32e36], having as a reference the ultimate analysis of residues [37].
b
Based on [37].
c
Based on average Residue to product ratio (RPR) proposed by [38e49].
d
As for crop straws, except for sugarcane straw, an availability of 100% has been considered, admitting that straw is currently left on the farmland without any recovery. A
factor of 65% has been assumed for sugarcane straw, taking into account the rate of farmland that is harvest mechanically with no open-air burning [50].
e
According to [51], 70% of rice husk are directly used in CHP units. Only 30% of total residues are available for bioelectricity generation.
f
Considering the period in months per year during which raw materials are available. It is used as a proxy for the period in which the crop harvest occurs. Based on [52].

Fig. 2. Technical, environmental sustainable and techno-economic potential of bioenergy generation.

Source: Adapted of [27,56,57].

residue yields increase up to a certain level and then remain
constant after that. Thus, field surveys to measure residue pro-
duction of crops under different climate conditions in several
Brazilian states would reduce the uncertainty of the conducted
assessment.
The environmental sustainable rate (ESR) assumes that part of
the residues needs to remain on the farmland to regulate the
ecosystem. This factor should be evaluated locally based on specific
crops, climate and soil conditions of agricultural land. However, to
the authors' knowledge, such data are not available for Brazilian
conditions. Thus, in this study, a conservative average removal rate
of 30% has been considered (based on [38,40,60e64]). The potential
of residues is further restricted by competition with other non-
energy uses and logistic constraints, as described by the available
rate (ARi), as presented in Table 1.
The power conversion efficiency (h) of the standalone, biomass-
fuelled Rankine power plant is assumed to be 18% [21], which is
quite a conservative assumption. Although more advanced
 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533
technologies are already available in the market, the heterogeneous
mix of residues and their different physicochemical characteristics
are expected to reduce boiler efficiency to lower levels than under
normal conditions.
Table 2 summarises the key assumptions made to estimate the
technical and environmentally-friendly and techno-economic po-
tentials. Under the technical potential, availability of residues has
no restrictions, excepted for its use in other energy or non-energy
processes, as detailed in Table 1. As for the environmentally sus-
tainable potential, a theoretical constraint for removal of residues
has been applied due to environmental concerns about soil erosion
and nutrient recycle, as earlier explained. The economic potential,
on the other hand, assumes that only biomass residues within a
circle of 50 km radius [65] from power substations were able to be
converted into bioelectricity in centralised thermal power plants
(see Section 2.2.2).
2.2.2. Spatial quantification
Bioenergy from agriculture and agro-industry has significant
technical and environmentally sustainable potentials in specific
municipalities of Brazil. Although this knowledge is important, it is
not enough to propose policies and projects that enable its energy
recovery. Thus, it is fundamental to quantify its economic and
market potentials. This paper assessed the economic potential by
identifying geographically the best suitable areas for the develop-
ment of bioenergy power plants by applying a GIS analysis. The
most important criteria to identify the suitability of areas of the
bioenergy power plants were the concentration of biomass resi-
dues by area and their proximity to power substations. For this
purpose, the technical and environmentally sustainable potential
was allocated to the respective rural areas of municipalities' shape
files with their division obtained from IBGE with datum SIRGAS
2000 [58]. Then, shape files were converted to the “GCS South
American 1969” geographical coordinates by using the “South
America Albers Equal Area Conic” projection. Rural areas of mu-
nicipalities were calculated using GIS tools. An indicator of con-
centration of residual biomass was calculated for every
municipality by dividing the technical potential (GWh/year) by the
respective area (km2). As a first approximation to estimate the
economic potential, it is considered, in a conservative way, that only
biomass residues spread within a circle of 50 km radius are
economically feasible to be used in centralised power plants close
to power substations where they could be connected. Similar
studies evaluating economic potential for renewable energy sour-
ces used similar approaches (40 km) as main criteria to restrict the
technical potential [66,67]. A shape file containing coordinates of
power substations was obtained from the Brazilian electricity
regulatory agency (ANEEL) [68]. Using GIS tools a buffer of 50 km
radius was drawn around each power substation. The area of each
municipality within the circle was then calculated to estimate the
economic bioenergy potential.
Table 2
Key assumptions of estimated technical and environmentally-friendly and techno-economic potentials.
Estimated potentials Assumptions
Technical Energy recovery of biomass residues via direct combustion (biomass-fuelled Rankine power plant).
Power conversion efficiency (h) is assumed as 18%.
Availability of residues has no restrictions, excepted for its use in other energy or non-energy processes (see factors in Table 1).
Environmentally Only 30% of total residues are collected, in order to protect the ecosystem from erosion and nutrient depletion.
sustainable
Techno-economic Only biomass residues spread within a circle of 50 km radius from the power substations are economically feasible to be used in centralised
power plants.
525
2.3. Environmental assessment
2.3.1. Goal and scope
In order to estimate the energy savings and avoided global
environmental loads of substituting marginal electricity generated
from natural gas by the proposed residue-based bioelectricity
system, a comparative Consequential Life Cycle Assessment (CLCA)
has been conducted in compliance with the ISO 14040-44 guide-
lines [69]. CLCA applied to the power generation system is a pro-
spective modelling methodology that attempts to assess the side
effects of introducing a new power chain in the marginal power
generation system. It seeks to inform policy-makers about conse-
quences on the environment of including new power generation
chains in the overall power supply sector [70]. This approach has
been extensively reviewed in the literature [71e73] and applied to
evaluate the environmental impacts of energy chains [74] and
agricultural systems [75].
The assessment has been developed by modelling input and
output energy and mass streams with the software SimaPro 8.0.1®
[76]. Each system is composed by sub-units, which are segregated
in unitary processes. All processes are interconnected through
input/output flows. Results were then exported to an Excel inter-
face for further data analysis. Environmental impacts have been
assessed based on depletion of fossil fuels and GHG emission
indicators.
The model refers to the current Brazilian conditions of
bioelectricity generation from agricultural and agro-industrial
wastes. The geographic coverage of the study encompasses po-
tential of bioelectricity at a national level, thus the scope of the
study refers to Brazil's power generation. Whenever national spe-
cific data could not be collected for upstream processes, the scope
was enlarged to include regional and worldwide coverage. Evalu-
ated systems focus on practices currently conducted in Brazil and
do not attempt to foresee any potential technological de-
velopments. Thus, the technical scope of the model refers to current
practices. While other power generation options may be consid-
ered to convert biomass to electricity, such as integrated gasifica-
tion power cycles and organic Rankine cycles, this study adopted a
rather conservative approach, by selecting a thermodynamic cycle
commercially available with endogenous technology developed in
Brazil.
2.3.2. Functional unit
A functional unit has been selected in order to evaluate the
impacts of substituting marginal power by bioelectricity generated
from agricultural and agro-industrial wastes. Thus, a product basis
functional unit has been selected to evaluate systems from a
downstream angle. Impacts have been assessed per unit of gener-
ated bioelectricity (GWhe). Then, overall GHG mitigation potential
was estimated based on the environmentally sustainable and eco-
nomic potential of bioelectricity generated in 2010.
526 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533
2.3.3. System boundary and allocation
System boundaries of the bioelectricity generation system
include both upstream (collection, transport, and mechanical pre-
treatment of residues) and downstream processes (operation of
the power plant to generate bioelectricity) (Fig. 3). Additionally, the
analysis includes the “Cradle-to-Gate cycle” of thermal power plant
infrastructure construction, as well as the manufacture of agricul-
tural machineries and equipment. The reference systems describe
the baseline pathways substituted by the bioelectricity generation
system. Thus, the collection of agricultural residues displaces the
impacts of crop residues left on the field, mainly emissions of
nitrous oxide (N2O) released by nitrifying and denitrifying micro-
organisms that convert the nitrogen of aboveground residues into
N2O. Further, the recovery of agro-industrial residues displaces
disposal of waste in landfill and consequent fossil fuel resource
consumption and methane emissions. Also, the bioelectricity
generated is assumed to substitute electricity of the national grid
generated in a combined cycle gas turbine power plant (500 MW)
fuelled with onshore natural gas, and avoided depletion of fossil
fuel resources and corresponding GHG emissions.
2.3.4. Inventory and data collection
The life cycle inventory has been developed in line with IPCC
guidelines [77] and based on secondary data sets of EcoInvent li-
braries [78] and tailored to reflect the specificities of bioelectricity
parameters for technologies operating in Brazil (e.g.: carbon and
nitrogen content of fuels, collection distance from farmland to
processing unit, energy conversion efficiency and harvest ma-
chinery). Impacts have been assessed in terms of GWP (100 years)
of GHGs. While several air pollutants have a greenhouse effect, the
main anthropogenic drivers for radiative forcing in the bioenergy
sector are CO2, CH4, and N2O emissions [79]. The aggregation of
individual GHG flows into carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) has
been conducted as recommended by the IPCC in its 5th assessment
report, following the metrics: CO2e ¼ CO2 þ 34$CH4 þ 298$N2O
[79].
The following paragraphs briefly describe the main assumptions
considered to model the bioelectricity and reference systems.
2.3.4.1. Bioelectricity system. The bioelectricity system comprises
upstream and downstream processes. Upstream processes include
Fig. 3. System boundary of the bioelectricity life cycle and reference systems.
collection of residues and transport from farmland to the power
plant unit (50 km distance, as discussed in Section 2.2.2). Pre-
treatment operations are also taken into account, which include
sun-drying, mechanical crunching and conditioning. Farming ac-
tivities have not been assessed, as energy consumption and envi-
ronmental loans were entirely allocated to crop products. This
assumption admits that farmers only grow crops to collect main
products, regardless of the agricultural residues produced. The in-
ventory employed derived from EcoInvent libraries [78].
Upstream processes include the operation of the biomass power
plant and emissions of methane and nitrous oxide from incomplete
combustion of residues. Carbon dioxide emissions released from
biomass combustion were not included in the inventory, as biomass
life cycle is assumed to be carbon neutral; i.e., carbon emissions
emitted during biomass combustion are equal to the atmospheric
carbon dioxide up taken during biomass growth.
Emission factors were given by [77] and approximated to factors
of generic primary solid biomass combustion. The energy required
and environmental loans of infrastructure of power plant compo-
nents (boiler, turbine and generator) have also been inventoried
[78]. Table 3 summarised key parameters of the bioelectricity sys-
tem assumed in the conducted LCA.
2.3.4.2. Reference systems
2.3.4.2.1. Agricultural residues left on the field. As a baseline, this
study assumes that agricultural residues are left on the field to
reduce impacts of erosion agents and increase organic matter and
nutrient levels of the soil. On the downside, these aboveground
residues also contribute to N2O emissions. Their impacts are
significantly lower than N2O emissions from inorganic and organic
N-fertiliser application and open air burning practices. Nonethe-
less, they should be also quantified in accordance to IPCC Guide-
lines of National Greenhouse Gas Emissions [77].
The N2O emissions of crop residues are released directly or
indirectly via leaching and runoff from land during nitrification
processes by nitrifying microorganisms that convert NHþ 4 to NO3

and realise N2O as a by-product, as well as denitrification processes
by anoxic organisms that transform nitrogen oxides (NO 3 ) into
atmospheric N2 via N2O. Direct emissions are calculated as a frac-
tion of 1% of the N-content of crop residues [77]. Indirect emissions,
on the other hand, are only relevant when runoff exceeds water
 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533 527

Table 3
Parameterisation of the bioelectricity system.

Parameters

Upstream
- Collection distance 50 km, rural road
- Transport type Generic rural truck powered with diesel
Specific consumption per km: 12.15 MJdiesel
Life time: 30 years
Tonnage: 5600 tonnes
Material expenditure per vehicle: 6 tonnessteel and 800 kgplastic
- Pre-treatment activities Sun-drying, mechanical crunching and conditioning
Specific consumption of diesel: 2.1 kJ.MJ1
residue
Material expenditure: 18.3 tonnessteel.MW1 and 1.0 tonnesHDPE MW1
1
Operating time yearly: 1,000 h year
Life time: 10 years
Efficiency: 99% (w/w)
Downstream
- Power plant operation Material expenditure: 20 tonnessteel MW1 and 50 tonnesconcrete MW1
Operating time yearly: 5,000 h year1
Life time: 15 years
Net conversion efficiency: 18%LHV

holding capacity of the soil or when fields are irrigated. As local
data are not available, a conservative approach has been adopted
assuming that leaching occurs in 30% of agricultural land in Brazil,
as suggested by Ref. [77]. Indirect emissions are estimated
assuming a fraction of 0.75% of the leached N-content of crop
residues.
Emissions derived from synthetic and organic N fertilisers, as
well as N mineralisation associated with loss of soil organic
matter resulting from management of soils, are not considered in
the inventory, as these impacts are associated to the agricultural
crop.
2.3.4.2.2. Agro-industrial residues in landfill. The reference
pathway of agro-industrial residues assumes their disposal in
landfills. The decomposition of these residues produces noteworthy
amounts of methane via anaerobic degradation of organic matter.
This inventory assumes that the decomposable and degradable
organic carbon (50%) is totally converted into methane.
2.3.4.2.3. Natural gas power plant. The bioelectricity produced
is assumed to displace the generation of natural gas-based elec-
tricity in a conventional combined cycle gas turbine of 500 MW
capacity with a conversion efficiency of 45%. The inventory ac-
counts for the direct impacts of the natural gas combustion, as well
as the indirect loans of upstream processes from natural gas
extraction and conditioning, as well as infrastructure components
[78]. Direct emissions from carbon dioxide were estimated based
on the carbon content of natural gas (74.87 wdb/wdb%), whereas
methane and nitrous oxide emission factors derive from default
factors of IPCC [77].
Table 4 reveals the overall life cycle inventory assessment of the
bioelectricity and reference systems in terms of non-renewable
energy consumption and GHG emissions.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Waste-to-Energy potential
3.1.1. Environmentally sustainable potential of bioenergy
This sub-section presents the sustainable potential of bio-
energy, without considering economic limitations, which will be
addressed in Section 3.2. Thus, it refers to the amount of bioenergy
that could be recovered under environmentally sustainable
practices.
Fig. 4 reveals the spatial distribution of the bioenergy sustain-
able potential of selected agricultural and agro-industrial residues
in 2010. Overall, the sustainable potential is nearly 141 TWh/year,
which is equivalent to 27% of electricity generated in Brazil in 2010.
This potential is mainly concentrated in the Southeast (33%), South
(28%), and Midwest (27%), which host major agricultural areas,
while the North and Northeast regions have limited bioenergy
potential. Nearly 88% of total potential derive from residues of

Table 4
Life cycle inventory of bioelectricity and reference systems.

Non-renewable energy consumption (kgoil eq GWh1) CO2 (kg GWh1) CH4 (kg GWh1) N2O (kg GWh1) GHG (kgCO2e GWh1)

Bioelectricity system
Upsteam
- Collection 2.98Eþ00 8.48Eþ00 1.36E03 3.02E04 8.62Eþ00
- Transport 1.07Eþ00 2.62Eþ00 3.53E03 2.63E04 2.82Eþ00
- Pre-treatment 1.84Eþ01 6.26Eþ01 1.47E  01 2.71E  02 7.57Eþ01
- Infrastructure 2.83Eþ00 1.12Eþ01 1.75E02 3.61E04 1.19Eþ01
Downstream
- Power plant op. 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 5.40Eþ02 7.20Eþ01 3.98Eþ04
- Infrastructure 1.03Eþ00 3.87Eþ00 1.27E02 2.01E04 4.36Eþ00

Total 2.63Eþ01 8.88Eþ01 5.40Eþ02 7.20Eþ01 3.99Eþ04

Reference systems
- Agricultural Residues left on the field 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 2.55E01 7.59Eþ01
- Agro-industrial residues in landfill 4.09E04 0.00Eþ00 2.87Eþ02 0.00Eþ00 9.75Eþ03
- Natural gas-based electricity life cycle 1.92Eþ05 4.49Eþ05 8.02Eþ00 8.00E01 4.45Eþ05
528 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533

Fig. 4. Environmentally sustainable bioenergy potential.

Fig. 5. Estimation of economic bioenergy potential.

 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533
sugarcane, soybean and maize crops, as these are the main agri-
cultural cash crops in Brazil.
3.1.2. Economic feasible potential
Fig. 5 shows the areas in Brazil considered with economic po-
tential to implement centralised bioenergy power plants within
50 km from power substations of the national power grid network
(see Section 2.3). A further detailed figure, which presents a
regional zoom of each region in Brazil, is presented in Annex A. The
overall economic potential of bioenergy in Brazil is estimated to be
39 TWh, which represents around 8% of total electricity con-
sumption in 2010. Considering an average annual availability factor
of 50% (based on Table 1), a complete use of the estimated potential
means an installed capacity of around 9 GW. Similarly to the
technical potential, major opportunities to implement economic
feasible bioenergy power plants are in the Midwest (22 TWh),
Northeast (9 TWh) and North (7 TWh) regions.
Fig. 6 details the area where are located the two municipalities
with the highest economic bioenergy potential of Brazil, namely
Prado
polis and Santa Lúcia municipalities in S~ ao Paulo State. As
results show, in the Midwest and South regions there are munici-
palities with more than 550 kWh/year/km2.
However, when an economic potential is concentrated in a
few areas its deployment becomes much easier, which is not the
case here. Instead, this amount of energy is spread within big
areas in Brazil. This is precisely one of the barriers for increasing
biomass residues use in the country. Nevertheless, policies could
be proposed to encourage cooperative schemes between agro
producers in rural areas. Several authors point out the success of
this kind of policies in Denmark [80,81], where networks of agro
producers were organized in the form of cooperatives. This type
of policy would be even more urgent in a large country, such as
Brazil, lowering transaction costs and allowing for each agro
productive unit to supply its biomass residues to a large, cen-
tralised power plant, taking advantages of scale and access to
financing.
Other measure to be considered is the creation of new grids to
transport electricity produced in the countryside to the main
Fig. 6. Economic bioenergy potential in some municipalities of the Southeast region.
529
transmission and distribution lines. In addition, considering that
medium and small cities are close to some of the main residue
potentials identified in this study, advanced local grids with
distributed generation from biomass could also be proposed.
Actually, the economic and market potential of biomass residues to
fuel small and medium power plants connected to distribution
lines and/or local grids should also be evaluated in future works,
with an approach similar to [82], or even including innovative
technological options, such as mini and micro generators based on
Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) [83e87]. The aim of the current study
was to focus on centralised power systems only.
3.2. Environmental benefits and energy savings
Table 5 lays out the yearly fossil fuel resources and GHG emis-
sion savings of introducing bioelectricity in the electricity genera-
tion matrix, replacing natural gas-based electricity and avoiding
impacts from agricultural waste left on the field and agro industrial
waste disposal treatment in landfills. Considering the economic
potential of bioenergy, environmental loads of bioelectricity gen-
eration over a year are 1.56 million tonne CO2e, and could reach
5.63 million tonne CO2e, when considering the environmentally
sustainable potential. Impacts are mainly associated to the com-
bustion of biomass in the power plants. Although bioelectricity
plants are admitted to have no net carbon dioxide emissions due to
carbon offsets during growth of biomass by photosynthesis pro-
cesses, emission factors of methane and nitrous oxide emissions are
high, given the incomplete combustion in biomass-based power
generation units.
Avoided emissions, on the other hand, are nearly 17.58 million
tonnes of CO2e emissions. Savings are mainly related to down-
stream processes; i.e., avoiding combustion of natural gas to
generate electricity. The impacts could be further minimised up to
63.63 million tonnes of CO2e emissions if accounting for the envi-
ronmentally sustainable potential. When compared to the overall
emissions of the energy sector in Brazil, the bioelectricity potential
has a significant potential to mitigate GHG emissions. In fact, in
2010, the energy sector contributed to 399 million tonnes of GHG
530 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533

Table 5
GHG emissions of the bioenergy system and avoided impacts.

Bioelectricity system (environmentally Bioelectricity system (economic Avoided impacts (environmentally Avoided impacts (economic
sustainable potential) (mil tCO2e yr1) potential) (mil tCO2e yr1) sustainable potential) (mil tCO2e yr1) potential) (mil tCO2e yr1)

Upstream 0.01 0.00 0.21 0.06

processes
Downstream 5.62 1.55 63.42 17.52
processes
Total (cradle- 5.63 1.56 63.63 17.58
to-grave)

emissions, which was equivalent to nearly one third of the overall plants could be through public-private partnerships to support
GHG emission in Brazil [88]. In the future, energy sector related environmental projects, as bioelectricity can result in significant
GHG emissions tend to sharply rise, as suggested by some recent GHG emission reductions from replacing natural gas-based elec-
studies (see [10,89,90]). Thus, in mid- and long-term bioelectricity tricity. The total GHG mitigation is nearly 18 million tonne CO2e/
will play an essential role to guarantee a secure and sustainable year and could reach 64 million tonne CO2e yearly, when the
power supply in Brazil. technical sustainable potential is considered.
Furthermore, supporting policies to foster centralised genera-
tion under a cooperative scheme would result in gains of economy
of scale and improve the reliability of the feedstock supply. Also,
4. Final remarks
state governments should reconsider the power distribution
network, as several municipalities with high bioenergy technical
This study sought to quantify the technical, sustainable and
potential do not have a neighbouring substation unit, which
economically feasible potentials of agricultural and agro-industrial
makes non-viable the implementation of a centralised biomass
residues to generate electricity via direct combustion in centralised
power plant.
power plants in Brazil. Further, the energy savings and GHG
Despite the efforts to conduct an accurate analysis of bioenergy
emission reduction potential of replacing natural gas-based elec-
potential in Brazil, this study presents limitations that should be
tricity by bioenergy have been assessed. To this end, an integrated
revised in future works to enhance the robustness of the findings:
statistical, a GIS-based analysis and a life cycle assessment have
been conducted.
i. Residue/product ratio and residue removal ratio are site-
Overall results reveal that the environmentally sustainable po-
specific and should be adjusted to Brazilian farming charac-
tential is nearly 141 TWh/year, mainly concentrated in the South,
teristics, rather than assumed based on theoretical values;
Southeast, and Midwest regions. Residues of sugarcane, soybean
ii. The availability of agricultural residues for bioenergy po-
and maize crops are the major feedstock for available bioenergy. On
tential should be further investigated on the field, as some
the other hand, the economic potential is far lower, totalling some
leftovers may be already used in other economic activities,
39 TWh/year. As for 2010, the evaluated biomass has no other ap-
which are not officially reported;
plications and is rather left on agricultural fields or treated in
iii. The combustion of residues is assumed to take place in a
landfill facilities. However, in the future, other uses might become
common boiler, but physical characteristics of residues might
cost-effective and possible competition might arise with the energy
interfere with boiler efficiencies;
sector. This is particularly possible for bagasse leftovers in sugar-
iv. The density of residues was uniformly considered in each
cane distilleries, which might have other valuable applications in
municipality, but in reality residues are heterogeneously
chemical industries.
concentrated. Thus, further land use analyses should be
This gap between the sustainable technical and economic po-
conducted to specifically characterise the potential of each
tentials implies that constraints to bioenergy penetration for power
municipality;
generation portfolios are not related to a lack of resources, but
v. The economic distance to collect residues was considered to
rather owned to economic, logistical, regulatory and political bar-
be 50 km. Nonetheless, this distance may be constrained by
riers. In fact, agricultural residue resources are spread on the
several logistic and infrastructure limitations, which should
farmland after harvesting activities with limited energy density per
also be better examined; and
km2, which increases collection costs. Thus, a mix of measures
vi. This study is focused on centralised power options. This
could help boosting the use of residues in centralised power gen-
affected the choice of the power generation technology and
eration systems in Brazil. Firstly, the coordination of small and
the logistic restriction related to biomass collection. Further
medium farmers into cooperatives, or even the implementation of
studies could assess Brazil's waste-to-electricity potential
energy service companies (ESCOs) for investing in power genera-
through different technological options, such as gasification
tion facilities, would lower transaction costs. Secondly, investment
and organic Rankine cycles (ORC). In the latter case, it would
costs could be lowered through fiscal incentives. Thirdly, connec-
allow studying micro and small scale generators possibilities,
tion costs could be reduced through the definition of obligations
which would be mostly installed as distributed generators.
and control of market barriers from power utilities. Finally, regional
and exclusive auctions for residues' power generation plants could
be implemented by the Brazilian government, in accordance to
what has been done for other alternative energy sources in Brazil in Acknowledgement
the last decade. Thus, a fiscal incentive in the form of a Feed-in-
Tariff (FIT) would encourage farmers to diversify their activities Thanks are due to the Brazilian National Research Council
and include bioenergy in their business portfolio. Another alter- (CNPq) (401164/2012-8 - APQ) for financial support, and to Raul
native to finance the implementation of centralised biomass power Miranda for his helpful comments about GIS processing data.
 J. Portugal-Pereira et al. / Biomass and Bioenergy 81 (2015) 521e533 531

Annex A

Fig. A. Economic bioenergy potential per region in Brazil.

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