Funder: Invest NI CASE
Duration: 04 January 2016 to 31 March 2018
Staff Involved: Dr C Brandoni
There is an opportunity for Northern Ireland to take a stake in its own energy future, by utilising previously un-explored purpose grown and incidental agricultural biproducts. Within Northern Ireland, there are known to be considerable quantities of biomass materials, for example forestry and aboricultural risings, manufacturing process by-products and agri-food chain wastes, that may have potential as biomass fuels. There are a possible 700,000 tonnes of these materials available on a continuous basis within the country. There may be potential to utilise low-energy content fuels to blend with higher energy fuels, especially if the former is a low-cost product that meets the other criteria for biomass fuels. Laboratory analysis allowed the determination of the Gross Energy, also known as the Gross Calorific Value (GCV) or the Higher Heating Value (HHV) of current and potential fuels.