PAI’s Director Eric Toensmeier has just published an article in Scientific American with Dennis Garrity of the Global Evergreening Alliance. The article looks at future demand for biomass, as many climate change mitigation solutions use large amounts of biomass as feedstock. The article discusses demand, which overall is projected to increase in a business as usual world, but is somewhat reduced due to biogas digestors, clean cookstoves and paper recycling. To this is added the increased demand for BECCS, biochar, 2nd generation biofuels, and other mitigation solutions. Meanwhile supply from forests decreases with forest protection, but increases with agroforestry and production of dedicated perennial biomass crops on anthropogenic grassland. The article is not open access, but you can email PAI for an electronic copy.
Perennial industrial crops, like biomass crops, are an important but complex part of agriculture and industry’s mitigation potential.
The Perennial Agriculture Institute 