Biomass Resources for Biofuel Production in Northeast India
India’s overwhelming economic growth rate of 8 % on an average creates a huge demand for energy inputs. The swelling energy consumption has resulted in growing dependence on fossil fuels, which has in turn raised a gamut of concerns like energy security,
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Abstract
India’s overwhelming economic growth rate of 8 % on an average creates a huge demand for energy inputs. The swelling energy consumption has resulted in growing dependence on fossil fuels, which has in turn raised a gamut of concerns like energy security, environmental degradation, and pressure on national exchequer. Energy conservation and clean and C-neutral fuels in this regard offer the greatest opportunities. Biomassbased renewable energy has the proven potential in this direction. Since India has an agricultural-based economy, therefore, biomass– including wood, agricultural residues, animal dung, etc. – is available in enormous quantities. In India, about 40 % of the total energy requirement comes from burning of biomass, and more than 70 % of the population depends on it for energy requirements. The northeast region of India where traditional biomass is a predominant source of energy is no exception to this. However, burning of biomass has been associated with energy inefficiency and environmental hazards including health problems and deforestation. Therefore, a sustainable approach toward this end is adoption of custom-made technological intervention to use the enormous biomass resource and generate power in an environment-friendly and costeffective scheme. Biomass-based energy and power production can provide distributed power for rural applications and could effectively make up for the absence of grid electricity supply in many remote areas. Besides, tail-end grid-connected power projects are also currently highly
R. Kataki (*) • N.J. Bordoloi • R. Narzari • R. Saikia • D. Sut • L. Gogoi Department of Energy, Tezpur University, Tezpur 784028, Assam, India e-mail: [email protected] K. Goswami Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur 721 302, West Bengal, India # Springer Science+Business Media Singapore 2016 J. Purkayastha (ed.), Bioprospecting of Indigenous Bioresources of North-East India, DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-0620-3_8
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encouraged to support the Renewable Energy Purchase Obligation and its compliance under the Electricity Act, 2003. This chapter reviews the biomass availability, conversion technologies, and its biofuel production potential in the northeastern region of India which is known for its high biological biodiversity with numerous tropical rainforests, revering grasslands, bamboo, orchards and wetland ecosystems. Keywords
Biomass resources • Biofuel • NE states • First- and second-generation biofuels
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Introduction
Biomass has been a source for food, fodder, fuel, timber, medicine and employment in India which has a large agrarian economy. Total primary energy used in India is about 32 % which is still derived from biomass and more than 70 % of the country’s inhabitants depend upon the energy produced from biomass. Indian Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has started some programs to promote technologies which are capable to derive the energy from various sectors of the economy to m
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