Assessment of Biomass Resources Potential in Khorasan Razavi Province for Bioenergy Production

Introduction Energy and environmental issues are two common concerns of modern societies. Fossil fuels consumption is believed to be the primary factor contributing to severe environmental problems, such as global warming, climate change and acid rain, which are a serious threat to the world’s ecosystems. In order to stabilize the earth’s climate and prevent further global warming, the earth requires a 70% cut in present carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. In the executive summary of IEA (2006), it claims “Beyond 2020, the role of renewable energy in global energy supply is likely to become much more important”. Among these, biomass can be defined as all the biological materials produced and existing within an ecological system and as sources of renewable energy can be converted directly into energy or energy carrier materials. Regarding to biomass assessment, researchers estimated the sustainable energy potential of biomass resources in Thailand including: (i) agricultural residues, (ii) animal manure, (iii) fuel-wood saving potential through improvement of efficiency, (iv) possibility of fuel-wood saving through substitution by other fuels, (v) municipal solid wastes, and (vi) wastewater. The potential of each source was estimated for the reference year 1997 and for the years 2005 and 2010. The total energy potential of these sources in 1997, 2005 and 2010 were 525, 702 and 821 PJ, respectively. In Iran, Khorasan Razavi province is known as an important region of biomass production in the country including: crops, livestock and poultry. Hence, in this study the potential of biomass and its distribution were evaluated.