Doctoral School Sustainable Development - Optimal Locations of Biomass-to-Liquid Plants in Austria

Heat is a by-product of bio-fuel production. By using this by-product the profitability of fuel plants can be increased. Because extensive technical infrastructure is required for such usage, only short-range supply seems to be profitable. The optimal plant site and size for bio-fuel production therefore also depends on the regional demand of heat. BeWhere* is a model for optimizing the choice of location of methanol plants. This choice is restricted by transport costs of biomass (e.g. poplar wood) to production sites and by transportation costs of bio-fuels to the gas stations. The model does not yet consider the demand for heating in the vicinity of the bio-fuel processing plant and the costs of heat infrastructure. The integration of this aspect into BeWhere is the focus of my current research interest. *Leduc Sylvain, Schwab Dagmar, Dotzauer Erich, Schmid Erwin, Obersteiner Michael. Optimal Location of Wood Gasification plants for methanol production with heat recovery.