Introduction and context: global biomass resources - Biomass as Energy Source: Resources, Systems and Applications - page 3

CHAPTER 1
Introduction and context: global biomass resources - types of
biomass, quantities and accessibility. Biomass from agriculture,
forestry, energy crops and organic wastes
Erik Dahlquist & Jochen Bundschuh
This chapter gives an overview of the available biomass resources globally today, as well as the
potential for enhancements of the production, and also shows how agricultural and forestry waste
can be utilized as resources more efficiently. Environmental issues and concerns are covered as
well.
Globally the official figures for the use of biomass as an energy resource show that it is
approximately 13% of all primary energy used. This is according to theWorld Bank figures. If we
go back 30 years, the official figure was almost 0%. The reason for the difference is that in 1980
only material that was traded was registered and accounted for. As it was obvious that bioenergy
was very important in many countries although not being traded the new calculation was made.
The figure of 13% has principally been maintained for 20 years, although the total energy usage
has increased a lot, around 30-40%.
The real production of biomass still is significantly larger as a lot of it is just decomposing in
the fields or in the forests. Some estimates gives a biomass production around 300,000-600,000
TWh/y, which is 2-4 times the total energy utilization today.
1.1 HARD FACTS
If we look at what figures there are available as “hard facts”, the World Bank is collecting data
from most countries of the world with respect to agricultural area and forestry area, as well as the
productivity with respect to different crops in different countries. TheWorld Bank is the statistical
data organization for the United Nations (UN) and gather not only this type of data, but also data
about the population, income etc.
It is of some relevance to group the countries into different economies as the average income
also gives a general figure of what resources are available for fertilizers, irrigation and mostly also
about how well structured and organized the country is. A country with high income normally
has higher productivity than a middle income country, which has higher productivity than most
low income countries.
In 2010, the UN estimated the world population to be 6860 million inhabitants globally. Of
these 50.3% were living in urban areas. This shows that now more people live in urban areas
than rural. The situation differs between low income countries, middle income and high income
countries. In low income countries only 27.9% were living in urban areas, in middle income 48%
with 77.3% in high income countries.
World Bank Development Indicators 2010 (World Bank, 2011) has calculated the average
income for each of the income groups. For low income countries this is 507 US$/capita, for
middle income 3980 US$/capita and for high income countries 38293 US$/capita.
There are 213 countries in the UN statistics of which 58 are in Europe and Central Asia
(EurCA), 35 in East Asia (EastAsia), 8 in South Asia (SoAsia), 48 in Africa in the sub-Sahara
region (SubSah), 21 in Middle East and North Africa (MEasNAf) and 3 in North America. In
Table 1.1, we can see how the regions are distributed with respect to the income for separate
countries, that is, how many countries in each region belong to each income group.
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