Energy crops versus waste paper: a system comparison of paper recycling and paper incineration on the basis of equal land-use

Abstract

Due to the renewable nature and CO2 neutrality of biomass, one may expect a large future demand for both biomass energy and biomass based materials. Because land availability is limited, at some point choices need to be made about the type of biomass that is grown and for which purposes it is used. In this paper we compare the related CO2 emissions of two biomass based product cycles. In the first system biomass is used for the production of paper which is directly used for energy recovery after consumption. In the second system paper is largely produced from recycled fibers. The land area that becomes available by paper recycling is then used for energy crop production. Preliminary results show that the second system leads to lower energy use and reduced CO2 emissions.