Scenario analysis of bioenergy resources and CO2 emissions with a global land use and energy model

Abstract

The purpose of the present study is to evaluate bioenergy supply potentials, land use changes, and CO2 emissions in the world, using a global land use and energy model (GLUE) including land use competitions and overall biomass flows. Through a set of simulations, the following results were obtained: (1) Supply potentials of energy crops produced from surplus arable lands will be strongly affected by food supply and demand parameters in the future, such as animal food demand per capita. (2) The policy option, i.e. the world, large-scale introduction of modern fuelwood by felling and planting in existing forest, will cause drastic reduction of the mature forest area but will cause little reduction of the accumulated CO2 emissions coming from both energy and forest sectors. One reason for this is that the additional CO2 emissions owing to the land use conversion from the mature forest to the growing forest will partly cancel out the CO2 reduction owing to the fuel substitution from fossil fuels to fuelwood. (3) When energy recovery of paper scrap is given priority to material recycling, bioenergy will substitute partly for fossil fuels; however the decrease in recycled paper scrap will cause an increase in roundwood felling demand. Hence, the results will be similar to those of (2).Bioenergy supply potential CO2 emissions Land uses Biomass flow Paper recycling