Abstract
The transportation efficiencies of centralized biomass processing facilities were compared to a proposed distributed preprocessing network with centralized refining facilities. Centralized biomass processing was defined as transport of baled corn stover directly from the field to the refinery. Distributed preprocessing with centralized refining was defined as transport of baled corn stover from the field to a biobutanol preprocessing depot and transport of completely dewatered crude biobutanol solution from the depot to a centralized refinery. For both systems, the locations of the corn fields, as identified through the cropland data layer, and of the refinery were fixed. For the distributed system, the biobutanol depot locations were variable and depended on different maximum transport distances (8 to 80 km) from the field to the depot. In this case study, site-specific transportation costs and biobutanol production capacities were developed for different agricultural regions in Kentucky. The distributed system produced a 32% to 63% reduction in total transportation cost with decreased (50% to 90%) fuel use as compared to the centralized system. The GIS transportation model demonstrated that on-farm biofuel production could be an effective means of producing biofuel and reducing transportation costs.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 161-175 |
| Number of pages | 15 |
| Journal | Transactions of the ASABE |
| Volume | 64 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2021 American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers. All rights reserved.
Funding
The authors sincerely acknowledge the financial support of the USDA National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA) Biomass Research and Development Initiative (Grant No. 2011-10006-30363). The investigation reported in this article (No. 15-05-055) is a part of a project of the Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station and is published with the approval of the director.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| USDA NIFA Biomass Research and Development Initiative Program | 2011-10006-30363, 15-05-055 |
| US Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Agriculture and Food Research Initiative | |
| Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station |
Keywords
- Biomass transport
- Depot
- Distributed biomass collection
- GIS location-allocation
- Minimize facilities
- Satellite facilities
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Forestry
- Food Science
- Biomedical Engineering
- Agronomy and Crop Science
- Soil Science