State-of-the art assessment of biomass waste resources in the Philippines

The Philippines has abundant biomass waste resource from numerous agricultural and forestry production operations. Despite the large volume of biomass wastes, the utilization for energy and materials production has been very minimal. Several studies were made in the past to assess the extent and distribution of biomass wastes around the country with a common conclusion that these resources have great potential for energy and power production. However, at present there are no large-scale utilization schemes for biomass wastes in the country. An accurate estimate of the biomass waste resource is a prerequisite to widespread utilization of biomass residues. This lecture presents the state-of-art biomass waste resource assessment work for six major biomass wastes in the Philippines. The biomass wastes include rice hull, animal manure, coconut wastes, sugarcane wastes, urban solid wastes and forestry residues. The resource assessment was made by first converting biomass waste data into the spatially encoded geographic information system (GIS) format using ArcInfo and ArcView GIS. The exact point sources of biomass wastes were incorporated in the map using the differential global positioning system (DGPS). The combination of GIS maps and GPS format make it technically feasible to develop programs for widespread utilization of biomass wastes in the country. Data in this format are compatible with computer programs developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) of the U.S. Department of Energy such as the Village Power Optimization Model for Renewables (VIPOR) and Hybrid Optimization Model for Electric Renewables (HOMER). The result of the current work could have substantial impact on future biomass waste utilization in the country. The UPLB Biomass Energy Laboratory has initiated the above state-of-art assessment work using the GIS and GPS facility of the GIS laboratory of the college