Biomass, which provides about 2.5 percent of power in the U.S., is one of the technologies that the Obama Administration pointed to in the Clean Power Plan released on August 3. If and how the technology will be leveraged is unclear, however, and will be determined on a case by case basis, according to Bob Cleaves, the president of the Biomass Power Association.
How biomass finally plays into the rules and procedures will depend on verifying the carbon benefits of biomass feedstock, whether only new facilities are counted in official results and precisely how biomass is defined.
Late last month, Enel Green Power brought a biomass plant on line. The plant heats geothermal steam at the Cornia 2 geothermal power plant in Tuscany, Italy. The goal of the project is to increase both the energy efficiency and power output of the geothermal cycle.
