A sustainable use of biomass for electrical energy harvesting using distributed generation systems

• Published in: Energy (Oxford) 2023-09, Vol.278, p.128036, Article 128036
• Main Authors: Rehan, Mohammad, Amir Raza, Muhammad, Ghani Abro, Abdul, M Aman, M., Mohammad Ibrahim Ismail, Iqbal, Sattar Nizami, Abdul, Imtiaz Rashid, Muhammad, Summan, Ahmed, Shahzad, Khurram, Ali, Nadeem
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bioenergy; Biomass; Energy policy; Renewable energy; Sustainability; Waste to energy
• ISSN: 0360-5442
• DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2023.128036

Pakistan has been facing an electricity shortage since the year 2005, which is negatively affecting the country's agricultural, industrial, and services sectors growth. In this study, Low Emissions Analysis Platform (LEAP®) software was used for forecasting energy mix of Pakistan for the period of 2022–2050 under the baseline and transformation scenarios. Baseline scenario emphasizes to enhance the share of hydro while transformation scenario emphasizes to enhance the share of biomass in total energy mix of Pakistan. Transformation scenario is recommended because hydro plants will retire in future and delay in construction of new hydro plants is noticed due to limited budget. In this regard, electrical energy is harvested using biomass based distributed power generation (BBDPG) for the sustainable economic development of Pakistan. The aggregate capacity of biomass is used which includes agriculture residue, forest residue, municipal waste, and animal waste. The results of this study show that the share of hydro at around 54.09% (614.14 TWh) is dominated over other renewable sources in the baseline scenario, whereas, in transformation scenario the share of biomass at around 33.3% (378 TWh) is dominated over other renewable sources till 2050. Pakistan could generate a total of 1135.20 TWh energy units in 2050, which would be enough to meet the future energy demand of 966.05 TWh by 2050. •Modeling of Pakistan's energy systems for the period 2022 to 2050.•Create balance between power demand and supply for economic development.•Role of biomass in energy mix is significant.•Provide sufficient power at competitive price and avoid capacity shortfall.•Proposed an energy policy for achieving renewable energy supply.