Abstract
Advanced biomass feedstocks tend to provide more non-fuel ecosystem goods and services (ES) than 1st-generation alternatives. We explore the idea that payment for non-fuel ES could facilitate market penetration of advanced biofuels by closing the profitability gap. As a specific example, we discuss the Mississippi-Atchafalaya River Basin (MARB), where 1st-generation bioenergy feedstocks (e.g., corn-grain) have been integrated into the agricultural landscape. Downstream, the MARB drains to the Gulf of Mexico, where the most-valuable fishery in the US is impacted by annual formation of a large hypoxic “Dead zone.” We suggest that advanced biomass production systems in the MARB can increase and stabilize the provision of ES derived from the coastal and marine ecosystems of the Gulf-of-Mexico. Upstream, we suggest that choosing feedstocks based on their resistance or resilience to disturbance (e.g., perennials, diverse feedstocks) can increase reliability in ES provision over time. Direct feedbacks to incentivize producers of advanced feedstocks are currently lacking. Perhaps a shift from first-generation biofuels to perennial-based fuels and other advanced bioenergy systems (e.g., algal diesel, biogas from animal wastes) can be encouraged by bringing downstream environmental externalities into the market for upstream producers. In future, we can create such feedbacks through payments for ES, but significant research is needed to pave the way.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 125-131 |
| Number of pages | 7 |
| Journal | Biomass and Bioenergy |
| Volume | 114 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jul 2018 |
Funding
This research was funded by the Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office (DOE-BETO) through Oak Ridge National Laboratory . This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy . The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan ( http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan ). We thank Latha Baskaran for creating a map of the Mississippi-Atchafalaya River Basin. We appreciate discussions with co-organizers of the Bioenergy Solutions to Gulf Hypoxia [Kristen Johnson (BETO), Cristina Negri (Argonne National Laboratory), Shyam Nair and Leslie Ovard (Idaho National Laboratory), Joseph Ralbovsky (BCS) and workshop participants have helped to shape these ideas. Thanks to Tony King (ORNL) for feedback on Grimes' life history diagram. In addition, we appreciate several very helpful reviews by the special issue editor, Alexandros Gasparatos and anonymous reviewers.
Keywords
- Bioenergy
- Ecosystem goods and services
- Gulf of Mexico
- Hypoxia
- Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES)
- Perennial feedstocks
- Reliability