Technical, economical and environmental assessment of biomass waste to electricity techniques in The Netherlands

The policy of the Dutch Government is to increase the amount of sustainable electricity generated within The Netherlands. In order to do this several scenarios are possible including power production by wind, water and solar power and biomass (waste) combustion. Using biomass for power production instead of fossil fuels decreases the emissions of CO2 since growing biomass takes up CO2 from the atmosphere in what is called the short CO2 cycle. Although the total area available to grow energy crops within the Netherlands itself is rather limited there are still large amounts of biological wastes available like: industrial organic sludge, sewage sludge, agricultural waste, demolition wood, thinning wood and verge grass. It is expected that by the year 2015 the 3 Mton of biomass waste annually available can supply about 150 PJ, which equals 4 % of Dutch power supply. Using this waste seems the easiest way to generate a substantial amount of sustainable, ‘green’, electricity. However, there is still not enough knowledge about the total environmental burden of sustainable energy sources in respect to fossil fuels. Also there exists no good environmental comparison between the different biomass conversion techniques. Most interesting techniques are the biomass-integrated gasifier with combined cycle (BIG CC), the stand-alone combustor with steam-cycle and the co-combustion of biomass in a regular power plant. Also a comparison can be made with the combustion of biomass in a domestic waste-incinerator, which is th