Commercializing Conventional and Advanced Transport Biofuels from Biomass and Other Renewable Feedstocks; Focus on Sweden

by Mahmood Ebadian, Jim McMillan and Jack Saddler (IEA Bioenergy Task 39 Newsletter) ... Task 39’s main focus remains on drop-in biofuels for heavy duty transport, i.e., transport sectors where substantial electrification isn’t foreseen in the near-to-mid-term. It is recognized that beyond on-going technical innovation, effective policies will have to be developed and implemented to establish economically viable drop-in biofuels. The Task is especially interested in advancing biofuels for marine and aviation applications, partly because both of these transport sectors are highly international in addition to each having its own unique characteristics and challenges. Future work in this area will include:

a) assessing the various methods used to measure/follow the “green” molecules when adopting co-processing and upgrading strategies within existing petroleum refineries; and

b) extending Techno-Economic Assessments (TEA) and Life Cyle Analysis (LCA) studies of leading and proposed routes to drop-in biofuels production.

Task 39 will update its previous reports on “Biofuels for the marine shipping sector” and “Drop-in Biofuels”. In the meantime, the most recent 2018-2019 drop-in biofuels report will form the basis for establisheing future collaborations with other Tasks such as Task 33 (Gasification), Task 34 (Direct Thermal Liquefaction), Task 43 (Feedstocks) and Task 45 (Climate and Sustainability) as well as with allied organizations such as IEA HQ, IRENA, GBEP, etc.

Task 39 will continue to investigate the life cycle and sustainability attributes of different biofuel production pathways. As sustainability and carbon intensity metrics are playing an ever more crucial role in policies for biofuels development and use, sustainability assessment remains a high profile activity for the Task. The contributions of LCA experts and the biofuel industry attending the recent the EU’s Joint Research Center-Task 39 sustainability workshop helped to further focus Task 39’s work proposed for this area.

Proposed future activities include developing complete high-quality data sets for LCA models and making these data sets available to model developers/users to incorporate into their assessments; developing white/peer-reviewed papers on implications of using different allocation methods; and developing a position paper on the best practices for
doing an LCA for co-processing applications. Task 39 is organizing a biofuels LCA session at the BBEST meeting being held March 30- April 1, 2020 in São Paulo, Brazil where updates and progress on LCA-related issues will be presented.

Techno-economic Assessment or Analysis (TEA) of co-processing will be another focus of Task 39 in the current triennium. Assessing methods to reliably/accurately/cost effectively “track the green molecules” will be another focus, and in this area Task 39 will strive to involve both oil refineries and regulatory bodies such as the California Air
Resources Board (CARB) that are actively evaluating prospective methods for quantifying the renewable content of mixed fuels containing both renewable biogenic and nonrenewable fossil fractions. To conduct both LCA and TEA projects, Task 39 will likely collaborate with Task 43 (feedstocks) and Task 45 (sustainability) to better understand
the cost of sustainable feedstocks and their associated impacts on the economics and GHG reduction potential (and other sustainability attributes) of producing drop-in biofuels via coprocessing or dedicated production.

Thanks to Tomas Ekbom, Sweden’s Task 39 country representative/national team leader, representatives from several Swedish governmental organizations presented during the morning of the second day of the Task meeting. The presenters shared recent updates on the status of Swedish gasification- and pyrolysis-based technologies for biofuels as well as Sweden’s current technology-push and market-pull biofuels policies and climate investments. The main takeaway messages include:

 Despite the technical success of several pilot and demonstration gasification plants in Sweden, pyrolysis-based production routes to drop-in biofuels are currently favored within Sweden’s new emissions reduction obligation scheme.

 The Swedish Energy Agency funds biofuels projects in Sweden. Their total yearly budget is about 140 million €, with a similar contribution coming from the involved industry. The agency’s funding scope is broad, ranging from fundamental research to demonstration and introduction on international markets. The annual budget for biofuels research is 4 million €, with primary focus on development and improvement of processes for producing biofuels from lignocellulose and lignin. Funded projects favor TEA and other computer/paper studies as the budget is insufficient to support extensive experimentation, however funding support is also being provided for R&D infrastructure at pilot/demo scale, and for biorefinery pilots focused on pretreatment and biological conversion (technology push policy).

 Sweden has a fuel tax exemption/reduction policy to encourage the production and use of biofuels. The tax
exemption has varied from full to reduced tax exemption however since January 2018 all biofuels have been fully
exempted (market pull policy).

 Since July 2018, a quota mandate system is in place that mandates reductions in carbon dioxide emissions, with
reduction targets of 2.6% for petrol-type fuels and 20% for diesel-type fuels by December 2019 (market pull policy).

 In 2018, a public inquiry was conducted on sustainable aviation fuels to analyse how best to promote aviation’s use
of sustainable biofuels with low lifecycle emissions. Sweden is introducing a GHG emissions reduction quota for
aviation fuel in 2021. This reduction quota will apply to all fueling at Swedish airports, i.e., for both domestic and
international flights.

 The Klimat Klivet (Climate Leap) initiative is a state program to foster local climate investments, with total funding of SEK 6-10 billion for the period 2015–2020. This program supports investments that can reduce emissions and influence the transition to a low-carbon economy. It targets funding actions that will have the greatest effect on reducing GHG emissions.

 In addition to investing in low-carbon transport fuels and efficient vehicles and operations, as part of it’s strategy to
realize a transport efficient society, Sweden is also investing to achieve an increased share of transport by walking,
cycling and public transport.

 RenFuel, a Swedish biofuels company, also presented on their progress developing and deploying their technology.
They have a patented catalytic process that energy efficiently tranforms lignin from pulp industry black liquor into
renewable lignin oil (LIGNOL®). The company has developed 15 patent families covering over 40 countries and
spends 15-20% of its R&D budget on annually on maintaining and securing intellectual property rights.

In the afternoon of the second day, most Task 39 members participated in a study tour, visiting both the Henriksdal
biogas production and upgrading plant in Stockholm and Scania’s engine manufacturing/assembly plant in Södertälje.

On 18-19 September, a subset of Task 39 membership also attended and presented at Sweden’s Advanced Biofuels
Conference 2019. The conference was hosted by the Swedish Bioenergy Association and 200 participants from 24
countries participated. A summary of the presentations and project investment news is published in the October issue
of Bioenergy International. READ MORE