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Biomass

There was a time when biomass was going to solve all of energy problems. Then all of a sudden food prices soared as a result of shortages and people started to see the major flaw in using it as a source of power. There are still a few uses for biomass but the idea that it will ever become a major power source is starting to fade as people pursue other alternative fuel sources.

Biomass is the process of generating power through the use of things that are living or recently were. There are a lot of ways that this can be done and it covers everything from burning wood to biochemical conversion of biomass products to electricity. The most common sources however are the burning of the pulp that is left over from paper manufacturing, the use of ethanol and the use of waste products as a source of energy. For a time biomass seemed to offer a lot of potential as an alternative energy source but things have changed somewhat and a lot of people are starting to look at other options.

The main problem that biomass has is that is not a particularly efficient means of producing energy. In some cases it actually burns more energy to get the fuel to the plant than you can actually get out of the biomass fuel. The result is that it is really only practical to use biomass as an energy source if you can locate the plant close to where the fuel source is located. This seriously limits the usefulness since the cost of installing the wires to transmit electricity over long distances can be a problem.

The other big issue that biomass has is that in large part it requires us to burn food sources for energy. Obviously this is not the case if you are using waste products which is why these are the most common. However for other sources of biomass energy agricultural products are being used as an energy source. This will cause a significant rise in the price of food which is hardly in anybody's interest. The result is that we are probably going to be limited to using waste products as energy sources but since these are limited it will be difficult to meet our energy needs.

Biomass is also not a particularly environmentally friendly source of energy. Burning of biomass products produces all sorts of greenhouse gases which are just as bad as those of fossil fuels. The result of all of the challenges that biomass presents as an energy source makes it unlikely that it will ever be a major source of power. A lot of people keep working on it in the hopes that it will but the reality is that there are other sources of alternative energy that offer a better chance of replacing fossil fuels.