Forest biomass in Portugal

Evolução das áreas totais por espécie (ICNF, 2013, 13)

"A superfície florestal cuja espécie dominante é o eucalipto representa a maior área do país (812 mil ha; 26%), o sobreiro a segunda (737 mil ha; 23%), seguido do pinheiro‐bravo (714 mil ha; 23%). A área ocupada por espécies resinosas corresponde a 31% da floresta portuguesa, sendo a restante (69%) ocupada por espécies folhosas." (ICNF, 2013, 11)

Distribuição geográfica de instalações de energias endógenas + detalhe apenas para as centrais a biomassa (e2p, consultado a 31 de Maio de 2016)

Métodos digitais para inventariar a Biomassa. Image in Viana, Lopes e Aranha (2011)

Referencias:

Helder Viana, Domingos Lopes and José Aranha (2011). Assessment of Forest Aboveground Biomass Stocks and Dynamics with Inventory Data, Remotely Sensed Imagery and Geostatistics, Progress in Biomass and Bioenergy Production, Dr. Shahid Shaukat (Ed.), InTech, DOI: 10.5772/20025. 

ICNF (2013). IFN6 – Áreas dos usos do solo e das espécies florestais de Portugal continental em 1995, 2005 e 2010. Resultados preliminares. [pdf], 34 pp, Instituto da Conservação da Natureza e das Florestas. Lisboa.

Legislação:

Decreto-Lei n.º 166/2015 - Diário da República n.º 163/2015, Série I de 2015-08-21

Segunda alteração ao Decreto-Lei n.º 5/2011, de 10 de janeiro, que estabelece as medidas destinadas a promover a produção e o aproveitamento de Biomassa Florestal

Decreto-Lei n.º 179/2012. D.R. n.º 150, Série I de 2012-08-03

Primeira alteração ao Decreto-Lei n.º 5/2011, de 10 de janeiro, que estabelece as medidas destinadas a promover a produção e o aproveitamento de biomassa de modo a assegurar o abastecimento das centrais dedicadas de Biomassa Florestal.

Decreto-Lei n.º 5/2011. D.R. n.º 6, Série I de 2011-01-10

Estabelece as medidas destinadas a promover a produção e o aproveitamento de Biomassa Florestal.

heterogeneous catalysts

Hideki Abe, Jia Liu, Katsuhiko Ariga (2016). Catalytic nanoarchitectonics for environmentally compatible energy generation. Materials Today, Volume 19(1), Pages 12-18:

"In this review, we shed light on one of the most versatile energy-conversion technologies: heterogeneous catalysts. We establish the integrity of structural tailoring in heterogeneous catalysts at different scales in the context of an emerging paradigm in materials science: catalytic nanoarchitectonics. Fundamental backgrounds of energy-conversion catalysis are first provided together with a perspective through state-of-the-art energy-conversion catalysis including catalytic exhaust remediation, fuel-cell electrocatalysis and photosynthesis of solar fuels. Finally, the future evolution of catalytic nanoarchitectonics is overviewed: possible combinations of heterogeneous catalysts, organic molecules and even enzymes to realize reaction-selective, highly efficient and long-life energy conversion technologies which will meet the challenge we face."

Energy, Sustainability and Society Journal

Thomas Hoppe & Ellen van Bueren (2015). Guest editorial: governing the challenges of climate change and energy transition in cities. Energy, Sustainability and Society, 5(19).

"The main question in this guest editorial of the thematic issue, entitled ‘Governing the Climate Change Mitigation and Energy Transition Challenges in Cities’, is: How can effective policy strategies be designed and implemented to govern the challenges of climate change and energy transition in cities? We develop some preliminary answers to this question based on seven research papers that form the contribution to the thematic series"

Elaine Conway (2015). Engaging small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the low carbon agenda. Energy, Sustainability and Society, 5(32).

"This paper helps to fill a gap in the literature on SME engagement with low carbon initiatives. It demonstrates both the current areas of engagement and the perceived barriers to further engagement. These findings could inform policy makers in directing support to SMEs to reduce their ecological impacts"

Bastholm, C. and Henning, A. (2014). The use of three perspectives to make energy implementation studies more culturally informed. Energy, Sustainability and Society, 4(1):3

"One advantage of focusing on energy services rather than energy supply is that it opens up for studies of energy-related ways of living and how these may be altered [33]. Another advantage is that it draws attention to the fact that the same service can be provided by different equipments and sources of energy"

Renewable Energy Policy in the European Union: is there a firm foundation for the EU’s 2030 renewable energy targets? (2015):

"The first group consists of the member states with weak policy effectiveness (i.e. the lowest scores: less than 0.15) – these include Portugal, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, France, the United Kingdom, and Romania. In order to meet their target share of RES by 2020, these member states will have to make substantial improvements to their policy frameworks. Portugal and Luxembourg especially lag behind in this regard."

Energy from waste coffee

Activated carbon derived from waste coffee grounds for stable methane storage (2015):

"An activated carbon material derived from waste coffee grounds is shown to be an effective and stable medium for methane storage. The sample activated at 900 °C displays a surface area of 1040.3 m2 g−1 and a micropore volume of 0.574 cm3 g−1 and exhibits a stable CH4 adsorption capacity of ~4.2 mmol g−1 at 3.0 MPa and a temperature range of 298 ± 10 K. The same material exhibits an impressive hydrogen storage capacity of 1.75 wt% as well at 77 K and 100 kPa. Here, we also propose a mechanism for the formation of activated carbon from spent coffee grounds. At low temperatures, the material has two distinct types with low and high surface areas; however, activation at elevated temperatures drives off the low surface area carbon, leaving behind the porous high surface area activated carbon."

Waste Coffee Grounds as an Energy Feedstock (2011):

"The aim of this study was to demonstrate the utilization of waste coffee grounds as a potential new-low cost alternative feedstock for biodiesel production.(...) spent coffee grounds were collected from local coffee houses. The grounds were dried in an oven at 105° C to remove moisture (mostly 25 wt%) and then the oil was extracted by applying a soxhlet process. A low-boiling organic solvent such as n-hexane was used. Afterwards the oil was separated from the solvent using a rotary evaporator and its physicochemical properties were measured. The experimental results showed that the oil content of spent coffee grounds is between 10-15 % w/w (on a dry weight basis). The oil was converted to biodiesel via transesterification reaction. All the reactions were carried out at 65oC for 2 h with anhydrous methanol in methanol-to-oil molar ratio, 9:1using sodium hydroxide (NaOH) as catalyst in amount (1%). The conversion of coffee oil was found to be about 92 %. Finally, the quality parameters of the produced biodiesel were determined according to the European standard EN 14214. (...) In addition, the waste solid remaining after the oil extraction can be utilized as compost as well as fuel pellets. This work could offer a new perspective in the production of biofuels."