Publication Detail
How Negative Can Biofuels with CCS Take Us and at What Cost? Refining the Economic Potential of Biofuel Production with CCS Using Spatially-explicit Modeling
    | UCD-ITS-RP-14-74 Journal Article Sustainable Transportation Energy Pathways (STEPS) Download PDF | 
Suggested Citation:
Johnson, Nils, Nathan C. Parker, Joan M. Ogden  (2014) How Negative Can Biofuels with CCS Take Us and at What Cost? Refining the Economic Potential of Biofuel Production with CCS Using Spatially-explicit Modeling. Energy Procedia 63, 6770 - 6791
Global integrated assessment models indicate the importance of  technologies that can achieve negative emissions in scenarios that limit  warming to 2ËšC over pre-industrial levels. One of the most promising  options for achieving negative emissions is the production of  electricity or fuels using biomass coupled with carbon capture and  storage (BECCS). Given that the transport sector is relatively difficult  to decarbonize, BECCS can be particularly valuable for reducing the  carbon intensity of transport fuels. This paper combines  spatially-explicit biorefinery siting and CCS infrastructure models to  examine the potential for biofuels with CCS in the United States. The  outputs provide insight into the optimal deployment of biorefineries  with CCS from 2020 to 2050, including an assessment of the magnitude of  the required infrastructure and identification of regional storage  constraints. Furthermore, the model identifies the average biofuel  production cost at each site and develops geospatial supply curves,  abatement cost curves, and negative emission potentials for biofuels  with CCS over time.