The Challenge of Utilising Bio-Resources: A Regional Perspective

Although it is still not warranted to speak about the end of the fossil age, we certainly witness a trend towards renewable sources for energy and material. Properties of bio-resources however differ vastly from fossil as well as other renewable resources. They are storable, mainly de-central in their provision, have usually weak logistic properties and face severe competition from various sectors, in particular from the vital food sector. A stronger reliance on bio-resources to support the European energy system as well as to provide raw materials for conversion to material products therefore raises technical, societal and environmental issues that have to be resolved if a bio-economy is to become a viable development pathway. One major challenge is that regional technology networks become important as transport becomes a considerable concern for bio-resources. On top of that, the necessary high resource efficiency calls for strong interlinks between technologies. Particularly interesting will be the implementation of grid-overarching technologies that exploit the one big advantage of bio-resources, namely their storability, in order to stabilise energy grids. Another important question concerns the support of energy demands from industries. This paper is based on the “discourse book” of the European Sustainable Energy Innovation Alliance on the rational utilisation of bio-resources (2014) [1]. It will in particular address the regional challenges of a sustainable European BioEconomy.

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