Biomass as Renewable Energy Source

 

Associate Institution: the Energy Institute Hrvoje Požar, Zagreb, Croatia

 

The project supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of Srpska

 

 Implementation Time: 2009-2011

 

Biomass is a renewable energy source which can be used indefinitely to produce electricity, heat and liquid fuels for transportation. It can be directly converted into energy by simple combustion. During this process overheated water vapour is being produced for heating in industry and households or for getting electricity in small power plants. The fermentation of biomass to alcohol is the most developed method of chemical conversion of biomass. Methane can be obtained by anaerobic fermentation. Biogas obtained by fermentation without the presence of oxygen contains methane and carbon and it can be used as a fuel.

The main advantage of biomass compared to fossil fuels is its renewability. It is believed that loading of the atmosphere with carbon dioxide during the using of biomass as fuel is insignificant, since the amount of CO2 emitted during combustion is equal to the amount of CO2 absorbed during the plant growth. It has become evident that the current approach to the energy is unsustainable. Biomass, like its products, is not only potentially renewable but it is also similar enough with fossil fuels. Therefore, direct exchange is possible. Bosnia and Herzegovina (and the Republic of Srpska, too) has become legally bounded to the implementation of the United Nations Framework Conventions on Climate Change (Kyoto Protocol) with the resulting obligation of reducing the emission of gasses that cause greenhouse effect. The obligation is a very difficult task, while the use of biomass as a renewable energy source may have an important role. This use results in the reduction of energy imports, the protection of energy stability of the country and retention of the national income in the country.