Biofuels from Biomass - Novel Combustion Concepts for Sustainable Energy Development - page 30

in India. Companies such as Abengoa, Beta Renewables, and Iogen which use
agricultural waste, bagasse, and a variety of feedstocks will be much better placed to
adapt the technology for the Indian situation. Hence, there was an urgent need to
identify the feedstock available in surplus amount.
Table 1 gives an indication of the amount of waste biomass available in India
from agricultural processes. These feedstocks are very different to the feedstocks
being used in the first wave of cellulosic ethanol plants due to the makeup of the

agricultural industries in which they are situated, so only give a vague indication of
the amount of ethanol that could be produced. Some of these feedstocks may not be
suitable for cellulosic ethanol production. The technologies that are licensed such as
PROESA, from Beta Renewables and Abengoa Bioenergy; and those that gasify the
biomass such as KiOR and INEOS Bio, look set to be able to use their technology
within India at the present time.
However, Sukumaran et al. ( 2010 ) suggest that the vast majority of residues are
used as fodder, manure, thatch, and direct fuel, sold to the paper industry, burned
after harvest, or used in various other applications. As a result, perhaps, only 10 %
of residues may be currently available for fuel use. Sugarcane tops are the residue
produced in greatest surplus (79.4 MMT), but they are burnt in the

field after
harvest. Currently, the main residues available for exploitation are wheat straw, rice
straw, corn stover, and sugarcane bagasse (Sukumaran et al. 2010 ), amounting to
25.5 MMT annually and potentially producing 5.7 MMT of ethanol. It would be
expected some of these residues would be diverted to power generation, which has
already achieved signi cant success in India through rural electri cation plants

(Singh and Gu 2010 ).

Table 1 Surplus agricultural residue availability in India
Residue Surplus availability (MMTPA) Ethanol potential (MMTPA)
Rice 8.9 2.0
Wheat 9.1 2.0
Sugarcane 79.4 17.5
Corn stover 1.1 0.2
Cotton 11.4 2.5
Chillies 0.5 0.1
Sorghum 1.6 0.4
Finger millet 0.5 0.1
Pearl millet 1.2 0.3
Pulses 5.7 1.3
Oilseeds 17.3 3.8
Bamboo 3.3 0.7
Pine 1.2 0.3
Water hyacinth 14.0 3.1
Total 155.2 34.1
Source NIIST-TIFAC report: ' Study on Availability of Indian Biomass Resources for Exploi-
tation: A Report Based on a Nationwide Survey. ' Reported through Sukumaran et al. ( 2010 )