Key Topics

Billion-Ton Study 2016

The 2016 Billion-Ton Report: Advancing Domestic Resources for a Thriving Bioeconomy is the third in a series of national biomass resource assessments commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy.
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The interactive Billion-Ton report on the Bioenergy Knowledge Discovery Framework (KDF) offers detailed data visualization for potential cellulosic and algal biomass availability in the United States. Users can find key data sets by report chapter and use Data Download for further analysis.
Volume 1 of the report evaluates biomass availability under specified market scenarios.
Volume 2 of the report evaluates the potential environmental sustainability effects of a subset of production scenarios described in Volume 1.

Marine Biofuels

Biofuels offer a cost-effective means of reducing GHG and sulfur emissions from the marine sector.
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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Bionenergy Technologies Office is working with the Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration, national laboratories, and industry stakeholders to examine the economic and technical feasibilities for biomass-derived fuels in the maritime sector.

Sustainable Aviation Fuels

Sustainable aviation fuels derived from renewable and waste carbon resources can reduce life-cycle GHG emissions in the aviation sector.
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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Bionenergy Technologies Office is conducting research, development and scale-up activities on renewable feedstocks and innovative conversion technologies that can produce low carbon intensity Sustainable Aviation Fuels

Sustainability

Referenceable and reliable information to support more sustainable bioenergy research and development.
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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Bionenergy Technologies Office works to support more sustainable bioenergy research and development via voluntary standards and a variety of public-private partnerships and provides available information on relevant requirements under U.S. laws and regulatory mechanisms for specific bioenergy production systems. The Office provides technical input to standards development but does not endorse any specific standard.

High-Octane Fuel Study

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Bionenergy Technologies Office sponsored a scoping study to assess high-octane fuels’ potential to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions and to understand barriers to successful market introduction.
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High octane fuel blends can potentially increase vehicle efficiency in vehicles designed for their use. These fuels are attractive because they could be used in the 18 million flexible-fuel vehicles currently on the road.

Short-Rotation Woody Biomass Sustainability Project

This research project examined the environmental effects of short-rotation loblolly pine production for bioenergy in the southeastern U.S..
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Studied environmental measurements included water and soil quality, hydrology, tree productivity, and stand-level ecophysiology. The resulting dataset reports the pre- and post-treatment water quality and hydrology data from a watershed-scale experiment that evaluated the effects of growing short-rotation loblolly pine for bioenergy on water quality and quantity in the southeastern U.S..