Webinar: Aerosols from Biomass Combustion

Organizer

IEA Bioenergy Technology Collaboration Programme (TCP)

Biomass is currently the most important renewable energy carrier and it is expected to play an important role in future energy systems, thereby complementing fluctuating energy sources like solar or wind energy. On the other hand, biomass combustion can generate in halable particulate matter (PM10) which can cause adverse health impacts.

CO2 mitigation strategies involving biomass therefore need to consider potential health impacts and ensure low PM emissions. This implies that measures ensuring low PM emissions need to be identified and enforced.

The IEA Bioenergy Task 32 performed a survey on the properties and health relevance of different particle types summarized as salts, soot, and tar from biomass combustion, and on measures to reduce the resulting emissions.

The overview shows, that in residential biomass combustion, organic pollutants are an important drawback due to incomplete combustion, which needs to be avoided by appropriate design and operation of the combustion and use of suitable fuel. In automated biomass boilers, organic PM is avoided by near-complete combustion, while inorganic PM from ash constituents is released. These particle emissions, however, can be effectively reduced by precipitation.

Hence biomass can be used as an environmentally friendly fuel, if state-of-the art combustion devices are applied and appropriately operated, while open fires and inappropriate use of biomass combustion systems need to be avoided.

Participant Information

• 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm Central European Time
• 11:00 am - 12:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time
• 3:00 p.m - 4:00 pm Greenwich Mean Time

IEA Bioenergy
E-Mail: electures@cif-ifc.org
Tel.: +1 (705) 7441715-630