Group 18 - Finland

8/11/2019 Group 18 - Finland

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Universiti Tunku Abdul RahmanBachelor of Engineering (Hons.) Chemical Engineering

UEMK3242 Renewable Fuel EnergyMay 2014

Project: Renewable Fuel Energy in the World

Title: How does wind energy and biofuel energy benefits Finland?

Group: FINLAND (18)

Name: M1: Liew Brian ID: 1002350 Year/Tri: Y3S2 100/100

M2: Gwee Ren Yang ID: 1002427 Year/Tri: Y3S3 100/100

Assessment Mark

Introduction /5

Status of renewable fuel energy production /15

Status of renewable fuel consumption and demand /15

Future prospects of renewable fuel energy production /15

Challenges of renewable fuel energy development: /10

One topic agreed with the lecturer /10

Organization/Formatting/Coordination /5

Grammar/Writing Skill /5

Citation/References /5

SUBTOTAL /85

ReviewM1: /15M2: /15

M3: /15

Total M1: /100 M2: /100 M3: /100


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Introduction

Introduction for wind energy:Wind power technologies involve the transformation of kinetic energy which is harvest from windenergy into useful mechanic power. The kinetic energy harvest from the air flows provides themotive force which causes wind turbine blades to rotate via a drive shaft. This provides sufficientmechanical energy to power up the generator in the wind turbine which results in the production ofelectricity.Wind power has been used by mankind as a power source since ancient times. However, in thenineteen century, the invention of steam engine made the industrial revolution to be possible byproviding cheap highly demand mechanical and electrical energy by the possibility of takingadvantage of waste heat.Steam engines did not depend on fickle of winds where the main source of energy needed to powerit is heat. This caused a big leaped in the industrial revolution. The success of industrial revolutionrelied on steam engine lead to the declined importance of seeing wind energy as a useful source.In 1979, the revolution of wind power begun by the mass production of wind turbines by Danishmanufacturers such as Kuriant, Vestas, Nortank and Bonus. The wind turbines manufactured atearly stage had relatively small capacities in the range of 10kW to 30 kW.At our current modern age, the average size of a wind turbine is around 1.16MW, where the latestprojects launched uses wind turbines between 2-3MW. Nowadays, wind turbines are being built in agroup where this action is known as the wind farm. Wind farms comprise the wind turbine,buildings and grid connection points.Wind power technologies come in various sizes and can be categorized as vertical axis windturbines (VAWT) or horizontal axis wind turbines (HAWT). Wind turbines can also be categorizedby location whether they are located onshore or offshore.Power generation of a wind turbine is considered by factors such as capacity of the turbine, windspeed, and diameter of the rotors. The main factor falls on the wind speed, where if the wind speedfor the particular season is low, low levels of electricity will be produced.Majority of large scale wind turbines are made up of three blades rotating around the horizontal axis.Such wind turbines account for majority utility scale wind turbines installed. Vertical scale windturbines are less aerodynamically efficient compared to horizontal axis wind turbines.Large wind turbines are generally used to produce large amount electrics which are mainly forindustrial usage. Small wind turbines are also used in the modern era and can be used to powerremote or off-grid applications such as homes, beacons, or farms.Intermediate sized power systems within the range of 100kW to 250 kW can be used to power avillage and can be connected off-grid. Such turbines can be coupled together with diesel generatorsand other distributed energy source for remote usage where there is no grid access. Small scaleswind turbines are emerging as important as intermediate and large scale wind turbines for it will beuseful for rural communities.

Introduction for biofuel energy:Finland is a land of abundance and consists of many growing forests. Finland's land area is

31million hectares, of which 26million hectares (86%) is forestry land, and 20 million hectares isforest. Renewable energy in Finland consist of 22% of forest industry black liquor and 16% of woodresidues. Finland was the third country in Europe out of other 30 country which in producing andsharing the renewable energy.In Finland, cross border biomass streams have been on the increase during the past decade. Theforeign raw wood which the forest industry has imported primarily for raw material has become amore important source of bioenergy. The production of wood pellets started in the late 1990s and


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has since been on the increase. More than 80% of the produced pellets in Finland have beenexported.In 2013, it is believed that Finnish scientists have found a way to turn dead wood into high qualitybiofuel for less than one euro a litre. They believe that they can convert more than half the energy ofraw wood - ligno-cellulosic biomass, if you prefer the technical term- into something that woulddrive a taxi, a tractor or a tank.First generation biofuels are made from sugar, starch, and vegetable oil. Advanced biofuels areproduced from a broader range of feedstock, including wood, straw, and algae. Advanced biofuelsare still under development and require further research to be carried out. However, significantprogress has been made and several countries are scaling up production of advanced biofuels,including the United States, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, and Italy.Finland has plenty of wood raw materials and top-level know-how for the production technologiesof 2nd generation biofuels. The forest industry has already announced significant investments innext-generation pulp plants, into which the production of bio-refining products could also beintegrated

Figure1: A stack of logs is pictured at the Forestry and Paper industry UPM-Kymmene factory inPietarsaari in 2009. Finnish papermaker UPM said it plans to build the world's first industrial scale

plant to refine a byproduct of wood pulp into biodiesel.

Figure2: Neste Oil's first biodiesel plant in Porvoo.


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Status of renewable fuel production

Status of wind energy production:

The graph above indicates the production of wind energy by using wind turbines in Finland from1997 up till May of 2014. From the graph above, we are able to see that wind production from 20002002 decreased from 77 GWh/year till 63 GWh/year. From the trend of the graph from 2013 -2014 we are able to notice there is a decrease of production of Wind energy. This is because at 2014,the production data recorded is only up till May 2014. By overall, since 1997, the production ofwind energy has been increasing steadily.Wind power production from grid connected turbines in Finland during 2009 was 277 GWh/year.This corresponds to 0.3% of Finlands electricity consumption. In 2009 Finland had a total of 118

working wind power plants with a total capacity of 146 MW. In year 2009, Finland had low windresources, the weighed production index was 83% and the capacity factor of standard wind powerplants was 91% in 2009.

Wind power production from grid connected turbines in Finland during 2010 was 294 GWh/year.This corresponds to 0.3% of Finlands electricity consumption. In 2010 Finland had atotal of 130working wind power plants with a total capacity of 196 MW. In year 2010, Finland had low windresources, the weighed production index was 74% and the capacity factor of standard wind powerplants was 89% in 2010.Wind power production from grid connected turbines in Finland during 2011ss was 481 GWh/year.This corresponds to 0.6% of Finlands electricity consumption. In 2011 Finland had a total of 131

working wind turbines with a total capacity of 199 MW. In year 2011, Finland had high windresources, the weighed production index was 98% and the capacity factor of standard wind powerplants was 88.5% in 2011.Wind power production from grid connected turbines in Finland during 2012 was 494 GWh/year.

This corresponds to 0.6% of Finlands electricity consumption. In 2012 Finland had a total of 153working wind turbines with a total capacity of 257 MW. In year 2012, Finland had high windresources, the weighed production index was 91% and the capacity factor of standard wind powerplants was 88.5% in 2012.Wind power production from grid connected turbines in Finland during 2013 was 771 GWh/year.This corresponds to 1.0% of Finlands electricity consumption. In 2013 Finland had a total of 211

working wind turbines with a total capacity of 447 MW. In year 2013, Finland had high wind


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resources, the weighed production index was within the range of 91% to 110% in different regionsand the capacity factor of standard wind power plants was 100% in 2013.From the graph above, we are able to see that, wind plays a major role in the production ofelectricity of wind turbine. Even if there is a large amount of wind turbines, but if the windresources are low by that year, the overall production of electricity will not be significant.Furthermore, from the above report, we are able to see that as we increase the amount of turbines,the amount of electricity able to be produced by harnessing wind energy increases. From year 2009,the total electricity production corresponds to the electricity consumption of Finland by 0.3%, by2013 due to the increase of wind turbine, the total electricity production corresponds to theelectricity consumption of Finland by 1.0%.By looking at the graph below, we are able to see that the production of electricity (GWh) by windturbines varies greatly. This is because wind plays a major role in the production of electricity bywind turbines. As, we are able to see that there is no constant pattern to be anticipated from theproduction of electricity by wind turbines, for wind comes by nature and cannot be control bymankind. The only method for us to harvest more wind energy to produce higher amount ofelectricity lies on the amount of wind turbines provided.

Wind speeds vary from time to time and causes wind turbines to be unable to produce energyconsistently. There are times where wind turbines are not able to generate and electricity. Therefore,wind power cannot be totally relied on as the sole source of energy whereby consumers must haveaccess to electricity from other sources to fill in the production problem by wind turbines.

In Finland these problems are not serious, as there are few days when there is no wind at all, andwind power will only be used to produce part of the countrys electricity. If total wind powercapacity eventually exceeds the total variations in electricity demand, this would make Finlanddependent on wind power for part of the baseload demand for energy, so a reserve power source

would have to be available for when wind conditions are unfavourable.

Status of biofuels productionin FinlandProcess of biofuel production i n Finl and

Biofuel is considered to be the most pure and the easiest available fuels on the planet. In the processof manufacturing the biofuels in Finland, all the fats and oil are turned into esters, separating theglycerin. At the end of the process, all the glycerin sinks down at the bottom and all the biofuelsrests at top. The process through which the glycerin is separated from the biodiesel is known as


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transesterification. Some of the chemicals which are used in the manufacturing of biofuels areethanol or methanol which brings into use methyl esters.Ethanol, for instance, can be made from sugars (like sugar beets and sugarcane), grains (like maizeand wheat), cellulose(grass or wood), and waste products (like crop waste or municipal waste). Upto 10 percent ethanol can be blended with gasoline and used in standard vehicles, whereas speciallymade flexible-fuel vehicles can be use any proportion of ethanol and gasoline.One of the advantages using ethanol is that they can be distilled even at the home without anyproblem. Besides, ethanol can be process in the type of continuous process which mean it can beruns all the time. This make the rate of reaction faster and few workers is needed. Lastly, the mainadvantages of using non-renewable ethene are because the end product is pure.With the continuously growth of biofuels, it significantly lessen Finland dependence on importedoil, strengthening national security and reducing Finland's trade deficit. As the biofuel obligationbecomes more stringent in the future, Finland intends to increase her domestic biofuels productionin order to benefit from the so called double credit mechanism provided in the Directive. This meansthat biofuels made out of certain raw materials will count double towards the goal of the biofuelobligation.Finland has a plenty of wood raw materials and top-level know-how for the production technologiesof 2nd generation biofuels. The forest industry has already announced significant investments innext-generation pulp plants, into which the production of bio-refining products could also beintegrated. Finland has extensively utilized VTT's top-level know-how in different fields in theproject. The significance of research and development activities is central in combating globalwarming.By further processing crude tall oil UPM is able to utilize the wood it uses for its pulp production ina more efficient way without increasing wood harvesting. UPMs wood sourcing is based on theprinciples of sustainable forest management, chain of custody and forest certification. UPM does notuse raw materials suitable for food.On 1 January 2011, the ethanol concentration of 95 octane petrol was raised in Finland in order toensure that the legislative transport biofuel obligation will be met. The increase in petrol ethanolconcentration is one of many measures aimed at achieving the environmental targets set for thetransport sector.Finlands goal in the countrys long-term climate and energy strategy is to reduce the carbondioxide emissions from road transport by 15 percent from their 2005 level by the year 2020. Thismeans that Finland strives to reduce her carbon dioxide emissions by some 4 million tonnes, onefourth of which should be achieved by increasing the share of renewable energy in transport, inother words by increasing the use of biofuels.

Figure3: show the density of forest in landspace within Finland.


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Finland is the most densely forested country in the European Union. Forests cover 23 millionhectares which represents about 75% of the total land area. Apart from the most southern parts ofthe country, Finland belongs to the boreal coniferous forest zone. The most common tree speciesare Scots pine (50% of the volume), Norway spruce (30%) and broadleaves, mainly birch (20%).Because of the remarkable forest coverage rate, the forest industries are the second largest branchamong all industries in FinlandIn 2006, the total forest industrial energy consumption was reported as 282,000 TJ, the energydistributions were: 75% from wood-based fuel, 5% from peat, 15% from natural gas; 4% from theheavy fuel and about 1% from other energy sources. About 80% of bio-fuels in Finland areproduced by forest industry and around 40% of the total wood raw material in forest industry is usedfor production of bio-energy from bio-fuel.Although the percentage of wood based bio-fuel consumption is over 75%, however, the energy informs of electricity and high temperature, high pressure steam are required in the forest industry,because the power generation from bio-fuel is not capable to supply the whole forestry industries,which makes the fossil fuels and other energy supplies like nuclear powered electricity is stillneeded.The total volume of the growing stock in Finish forests amounts to 2.189 million m

3over bark.

Since the late 1960s, the volume and increment of the growing stock have continuously risen and isnow 47% higher than four decades ago. The annual increment was 98.5million m3, whereas theannual drain is around 55-65million m3. Maximum sustainable removal for 20062015 is predictedas 72 million m3per year. During the early 2000s the amount of wood harvested from private forestshas ranged approximately from 40 to 50 million m3of wood annually. In 2006 roundwoodconsumption in Finland totalled 81.5 million m3of which 90% was used in the forest industries andthe additional 10% for energy generation. Finland is one of the leading countries when it comes toutilizing wood for energy purposes. Wood-based fuels currently cover one fifth of the total energyconsumption in Finland.

Figure: commercial roundwood removals by forest ownership category, 1970-2006.

Minister of Employment and the Economy of Finland believe their country has excellentopportunities to become the global leader in biofuel production. In Finland, the share of biofuelsused in traffic will rise to 20 percent by 2020 compared with the obligation for the whole EU of 10


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percent. Finland Government has implemented a significant programme of biofuel production basedon its resources of raw materials and its technology competence. The Minister said that forestry ismodernizing, the bio-economy on the rise, during this decade, the goal of Finland is to get a fewlarge-scale refineries.It is believe there to be quite major business opportunities for exporting such technology which aresizeable investment, 400-600 millions euro each. This leads to significant subsidy opportunity forbio refineries in the form of income to the commission from sales of carbon emissions trading rightsunder new trading period. Currently, there are applications for three bio refinery projects (UPM,Neste-Stora and Metsliitto-Vapo) have been submitted to the Ministry of Employment and theEconomy.These up-coming projects will increased use of second generation biofuels in road transport wouldprovide Finland with the most cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emission but thesustainability criteria of biofuels and their actual production cost still include many uncertaintyfactors that may have a significant effect on the different scenarios.The exporting and importing volumes of biofuels in Finland has previously been investigated in1999 within the AFB net project A compendious study on biofuel export and import flows and thereasons behind them carried out in autumn 2004 within the IEA Bioenergy Task 40 has beenstarting point for this study.

Double credit biofuels will be those manufactured of waste and residue materials, as well as non-food cellulose materials and lignocellulose materials.

Bioethanol produced in Finland of waste and residue materials as well as biodiesel produced oflogging waste meet the criteria for double credit biofuels. Their raw material may be waste, residueor other non-food cellulose and lignocellulose materials.

The life cycle emissions of this type of biofuels are as much as 80-90 per cent lower than those offossil fuels. Increase of domestic biofuel production will improve Finland's energy self-sufficiencyand security of supply and decreases the country's dependence on fossil


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Status of renewable fuel consumption and demand

Status of wind energy consumption and demand:Finland offers attractive opportunities in renewable energy fuel, this action attracts investors whichare seeking for new market. Opportunities of renewable energy fuel market in Finland are uniqueeven on a European scale.For the overall consumption of renewable energy, Finland is said to be one of the leaders in Europewhereby the renewable energy consumption is currently at 33% (2014).Before 2011 wind energy development has been very slow but wind energy development has beenincreasing after the new tariff system was introduced in 2011, whereby a guaranteed price of 85.30EUR/MWh is set for wind power, whereby the difference between the guaranteed price and spotprice of electricity will be paid to producers as a premium. A higher guaranteed price of 105.30EUR/MWh until the end of 2015 encourages the citizens of Finland to invest in building windturbines.By introducing the new tariff system, the rise in interest in the Finnish wind power market could beseen among the Finns whereby according to a survey carried out by the Federation of EnergyIndustries in spring 2012, over 89% of Finns would like to see more wind power installed.Due to the increase of demand in wind energy production, in 2012, there a total of seven wind farmsinstalled with six 3MW turbines in Simo, two 1.8MW turbines in Hamina, one 2MW turbine inKemi, eight 3MW turbines in Ii, ten 3-MW turbines in Tervola, and one 3.6-MW pilot plant inVaasa. Several other wind farms are in the building phase, so the new installed capacity during 2013will be 120130 MW.At the end of 2012, the total capacity was 288 MW and 162 wind turbines were operating inFinland. The average wind turbine size installed in 2012 was 2.8 MW, and for the total installedcapacity the average is 1.8 MW.Currently, almost 1 percent of the Finnish electricity demands are met by electricity generated fromwind energy. In 2013, 50 new wind turbines with a capacity of 162 megawatts (MW) were installedand connected to the electricity grid in Finland bringing the total installed capacity to 448 MW.During 2014, the installation of at least 80 turbines with a capacity of 190 MW is expected.The Finish government plans to achieve a 7% target for wind energy production in 2020. In order toachieve a 7% target of wind energy production in 2020, the Finish government is aiming to generateand increase the use of wind power with a target of 6TWh by 2020. This would require theconstruction of around 700 new wind turbines and a capacity of 2500MW. The following graph isthe forecasted results of total wind power capacity to be installed from 2014-2020.


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Status of bio fuels consumption and demandGlobal economic development and the growth in demand for petroleum play a part in shapingbiofuel demand. Demand for biofuel has grown steadily in recent years as a result of rising bio-mandated content levels and growing demand for fossil diesel. There were 21 million tons ofbiodiesel demands in 2012. In order to meet up with the target set by Finish government in 2020,wood-based biomass underpins over 75% of the nation's planned activities.

Biofuels comprise up to 40 percent of transport:The largest emission reductions can be achieved in the transport sector by using second-generationbiofuels that can be used in existing vehicle fleet. The share of biofuels inroad transport wouldincrease to as high as 40% in 2030. Cost will rapidly decrease if the emission goal is below 36% insectors outside EU ETS. This would require expensive investments to be made in Finland to reduceemissions.The use of greenhouse gases can only be reduced by a small amount, mainly through decreased useof fertilizers. The sustainability criteria of biofuels still include many uncertainty factors that mayhave a significant effect on the Finland's economy. The amount of subsidies for biofuels productionwill increase to around EUR 1,500 million cumulatively for the years 2020-2030.Generally, the impact on the economy package appears to remain moderate with regard to thenational economy. If the goals set for Finland can be achieved primarily through the increased use ofbiofuels. The calculations are based on the biofuels used being produced from domestic wood basedraw materials. The assumption was that bio-refineries would increase Finland's refinery capacity,which would open up possibilities for an increase in the export of refined petroleum products

Demand for renewable fuels is growing rapidly, and by 2020 the global market for biodiesel isprojected to be about 35 million t/a. Demand for renewable fuels is spurred by mandated usagelevels and new legislation under development in the field worldwide. The rapid growth of the corn-based ethanol industry shows the potential for biofuels. However for biofuels to make a substantialcontribution to the domestic liquid fuel supply, the industry must expand beyond corn-basedethanol.The Finnish forestry industry has a great deal of experience in raw wood exportation. During the 15-year period between, 1990 and 2004 annual raw wood consumption in the forestry industryincreased from 51.2 million to 74.9 million cubic meters. In the same period, the volume of foreignrose from an annual level of 6.0 million cubic meters to 17.4 million cubic's meters. In 2004, theproportion of imported raw wood provides 80% of the total raw wood import.

Table 1: imported biomass flows in

2004[4]

CN code volume price (/t)

round wood - 12,015,768 45.2

Chips 44012100 1458672 53.4

sawdust of wod 44013010 39146 17.3wood waste andscrap 44013090 146226 21.9

fuel wood 44011000 110463 17.6

tall oil 38030010 57690 192.9

Peat 27030000 46660 28.7

ethanol 22070000 23355 529.2
http://phys.org/tags/road+transport/http://phys.org/tags/road+transport/


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Table 2: exported biomass flows in

2004[4]

CN code volume price (/t)

round wood - 474578 81.9

Chips 44012100 111258 58.8

sawdust of wod 44013010 515 227.3wood waste andscrap 44013090 164261 89.9

fuel wood 44011000 4083 108.9

tall oil 38030010 120544 238.4

Peat 27030000 116348 88

ethanol 22070000 0 0

The largest biofuel exportation flow in Finland consists of wood pellet. The production of woodpellet at an industrialized level started in Finland in 1998, and the production volume has increased

rapidly. The pellet production in 2004 was estimated to be 225000 tons. In the early years Finnishpellet production was totally founded on exportation. In recent years, the domestic consumption ofpellets has increased.The action plan does not state a clear opinion for the introduction of biofuels as traffic fuel. Apreliminary target of 3.1 petajoule(PJ) in 2010 for biofuels consumption in traffic is presented. TheEuropean Union directive has set a target of 5.75% usage in traffic by the end of 2010. In Finland,the target of directive would mean approximately a 10.5 PJ growth of biofuels usage in the trafficsector from the zero level in 2004.The Finland national energy and climate energy is being revised and the renewed strategy will beintroduced in autumn 2005. The new energy strategy is expected to take a stand on biofuel use intraffic.The Government employs energy taxation, tax relief, and production subsidies for electricity andforest chips, investment subsidies and funding of research and developments projects as financialmeasure to implement the energy policy.The domestic production volume of biomass fuels is an important element that will affect the tradebalance of biomass fuels. In the following, the estimated, the estimated production potentials offorest industry by-products and forest chips are summarized.In 2010 the total supply of forestry industry by-products for energy use was estimated to be 101PJ,when the amount in 2002 was 97 PJ. The theoretical potential includes sawdust, bark and industrialchips but exclude pulp chips. A part of the sawdust and industrial chips is used as raw material forpulp, particleboard and pellet production. The theoretical supply potential of forest chips wasevaluated at 184PJ and the techno-economical potential at 86PJ in 2010. The largest share of technoeconomical potential came from logging residues, 40PJ, whereas the share of the stumps was 22 PJand a small diameter energy wood 25PJ.The domestic production potential of wood fuels is in theory sufficient to meet the usage targets.However, in practice the geographical location of the forest chip resources compared to the usagelocations limit the possibilities to increase the usage. There are also exist competition between rawmaterials and energy use of forestry industry by-product, especially for sawdust.


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Table 3: realized energy use in 2004 and the

government

target for 2005 and 2010 by type of renewable energy

source, PJ

source of energy/year 2004 2005 2010

traditional firewood 44 50 54

forest chips 19 22 38

black liquor 158 143 154solid processing residue 81 80 84

wood-based total 302 295 330

hydro power 53 49 52

other renewables 11 15 30

renewables total 366 359 412


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Future prospects of renewable fuel energy production

Future prospects of wind energy production:

Finland has good conditions for wind power production. The majority of wind farms have been built

along the coast, but there are also good wind conditions inland, where wind farms are currentlyunder construction and being planned.

Finland aims to increase the share of its renewable energy from 33% in 2014 to 38% of gross energyconsumption target in 2020. Finland sets its goal to achieve the production of 6.0 TWh during 2020.It is estimated that Finland would then be able to cover about 7% of the 2020 electricity demandwith wind power. Though the realization of wind farms in Finland is challenging, there is strongpolitical support and public acceptance which aid industrial development. Additionally, the windresource regime is favorable as it is almost constantly windy in Finland, especially near the coast.Wind energy potential is located mostly at coastal areas. There is a huge technical potential offshore,with ample shallow sites available. The deployment of wind energy has been relatively slow butsetting the target to 6.0 TWh/year for 2020. A market based feed-in tariff system which wasintroduced in 2011 has led to the rush for best sites. The feed-in tariff guarantees wind farmoperators 105.30 euros per megawatt-hour until 2015. After that, the compensation will be reducedto 83.50 euros per megawatt-hour. The higher feed-in tariff rate, available until 2015, createsincentives to quickly energize and connect projects to the grid. Once connected, the feed-in tariff isapplicable for a period of twelve years.At the end of 2013, a total of 211 turbines were installed producing 771GWh or 1.0% of grossdemand in Finland. This achievement brings Finland one step closer to achieving its goals in 2020.Furthermore, Finland aspires to reduce its greenhouse gas emission by 80% by 2050. In order to doso, Finland has to gather their technology experts to improve the production of electricity throughrenewable energy sources.The goal seems to be a hard one for Finland. Despite of the difficulties faced it is within Finlandsreach. But as long as all sectors that produce or consume energy cooperate reduction of carbondioxide will not be a problem.Wind power industries can assist this matter by increasing the amount of wind turbines so that moreelectricity can be generated and increase the efficiency of converting the kinetic energy harvest fromwind energy into electricity.Finland plans to further extend the building of wind farms out into the sea. At 2014, offshoreturbines are built 1020km from land, it is expected that 10 years from now, wind turbines will be


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able to be build 80km away from the sea, whereby more stable wind resources can be harvest inorder to increase the output of electricity through wind turbines.

Future prospect of biofuels energy development

Fossil fuels like coal and oil has played a main part in humanity's recent history, providing a vastenergy source which has fuelled much of industrialization and society's development. These fuelsare still the primary sources of energy for the world's developed nations, and yet demand for oilproduction is at an all-time high. Many experts and agencies in Finland have predicted that the rateof world oil has already peaked and it will only decrease from now onwards as fewer and fewer oilwill be produced.Current microbial biofuels is incredibly varied, and can both utilize and produce a wide variety ofuseful molecules. In the future, scientific advance will only make these systems easier to work with,because many microbial systems are well characterized and easy to manipulate genetically.Currently, there is no biofuel option available which solves all of the economic and environmentalissues associated with fossil fuels, but the potential for both fine -tuning biofuel-producingmicrobes, and genetically modifying species to be able to efficiently make use of otherwise uselessmaterials, makes microbial biofuels an important target for research.In the national legislation on biofuel distribution requirements (1 January 2011) Finland has pushedher target up to 20 percent. This is considered viable since Finland is able to increase her domesticbiofuels production with new technologies so to benefit from the so called double credit mechanismprovided by the Directive. The double credit biofuels will be manufactured from raw-materials suchas waste, residue materials, non-food cellulosic plant materials and lignocelluloses.

The Renewable Energy Directive is complemented by the Fuel Quality Directive (FQD), the goal ofwhich is to cut the carbon intensity of fuels by 10% by 2020, 6% being the binding obligation and 4percent coming from voluntary measures. The obligatory part of the reduction is achieved byincreasing the proportion of biological components in fuels.While Finland has numerous independent sawmilling companies, the big papermakers also havetheir own highly automated sawmill units. Nothing is wasted in the overall process: high-qualitylogs are sawn into timber, and the waste is used to make pulp or chipboard. Another important fieldof production is plywood manufacture, mainly using birch. In addition, Finland has a wide range ofcompanies serving the forest industry in sectors such as forest machinery manufacture and theprovision of consultancy services (e.g. the global consulting firm Jaakko Pyry).

The increased use of second-generation biofuels in road transport would provide Finland with themost cost-effective way of achieving the greenhouse gas emissions goals. When aiming at anincrease in biofuels use in Finland, both domestic and world market biofuels productions areavailable.

In the near future years, the ethanol for blending with petrol will be imported to the EU primarilyfrom non-EU regions, mostly from Brazil. Biofuels may be counted in the biofuels obligations onlyif they meet the EU biofuel sustainability criteria and the greenhouse gas emission reduction targets.

Micro-algae cultivation f or biofuels:We examine the aspects of micro-algae production that will eventually determine the futureeconomic viability and environmental sustainability.There are some factors why Finland does not prefer algae-based fuel but more keen to wood-basedfuel. First of all, Algae cultivation requires the addition of nutrients primarily nitrogen, phosphorusand potassium. Beside, Algae cultivation requires a source of carbon dioxide. Assuming algae have


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a carbon mass fraction of 50% it follows that producing 1 kg dry algal biomass requires at least1.83 kg CO2. It will release large amount of carbon dioxide which will definitely affect theenvironment. The majority of the fossil fuel inputs to algae cultivation come from electricityconsumption during cultivation, and, where included, from natural gas used to dry the algae. Algaeare temperature sensitive and maintaining high productivity (particularly in PBRs) may requiretemperature control. Both heating and cooling demand could increase fossil fuel use.


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Challenges of renewable fuel energy development

Challenges of wind energy development:Wind projects located in areas with low temperatures and high chances of ice and snow would notseem to be the ideal choice. Northern and Southern of Finland is covered in snow and has relativelyharsh weather conditions.To build a wind project in Northern and Southern Finland is expensive to construct and maintain.The sites of wind farms will be hard to be access which will result in higher risk to employees.Special equipment will be required for wind turbines in cold regions as small amounts of ice maysignificantly disrupt the collection of wind energy. Large accumulations of ice will lead to the stopof anemometers and wind vanes in the wind turbine. Mast of the wind turbine requires to be veryslender, however in icy conditions, there is a tendency for large amounts of ice to form on the mastwhich will greatly reduce the efficiency of collecting wind energy. The International Energy Agency(IEA) wind special task force on cold climate projects recommends lattice towers for mountingmeasuring instruments to reduce the formation of ice but this will greatly increase the cost. If thecups of an anemometer gain even a small amount of ice, wind speeds can be underestimated byabout 30%.Ongoing maintenance of cold-climate wind projects is vital. Up until now, relatively littlemaintenance has been undertaken on blades, but as the sector matures, significant problems withblades are being discovered. Flying ice particles has relatively similar properties to the sand whichwill cause the edge and the trailing edge to have high levels of corrosion.Once the blade cracks, water has high tendency to enter the gaps and freezes in it. A covered with5mm of ice can reduce the power curve by as much as 80%, this will lead to the decrease ofefficiency of wind turbines which will result in high loss of money.Another problem faced by the development of wind farms in Finland is the area needed to build it.Majority of the farms are built on mainland but due to the sound pollution produced by the windturbines, people are starting to have objections in building wind farms on land. Building new windfarms at offshores requires a lot of money. The construction costs for the floating foundations arestill so large so that the technique is not yet profitable in most cases.The main problem faced by wind projects are costing. If this problem can be overcome, windprojects will be able to flourish in greater lengths.

Challenges of biofuels developmentIn the past few years the changing world situation has generated intensive discussion about bio-fuels, much of it promising a source of environment-friendly energy that would also be a boon to theworld's farmer. At the same time sceptics argue that bio-fuel production will threaten food suppliesfor the poor and cannot bring any benefits to the environment. Thus, bio-fuels energy technologyneed further advancement, investment and policy facilitating agricultural innovation and properlyconsidered the trade.In order to minimise bio-fuels production competitive with food production, one of the suggestion isthe algae production that it could use marginal land. Solar radiation is one of the most importantfactors influencing algal growth and to achieve high levels of production throughout the year. Thus,

it is more suitable for algae farm located on warm countries where its insolation rate is not less than3000h yr-1. In other word, less warm countries such as Finland is not suit for this alternativemethod.The International Agency projected that biofuels would be competitive with petroleum at petroleumprices of between US$60 and US$100 a barrel. The competitiveness of biofuels, however, dependsheavily on the relative prices of oil and of agricultural feedstock for biofuels. When the demand offor biofuels increases agricultural price, the competitiveness of biofuels will start to decline, andrecent price for cereals in 2006 may signal such a trend.


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Biofuels include fuel sources that have been used for millennia, like fuel wood and charcoal, as wellas newer sources like ethanol, biodiesel, and biogas. These new sources depend on naturalvegetation, crops grown specifically for energy, or agricultural or other forms of waste and residues.Processing makes this biofuels cleaner and more efficient than traditional forms of biofuels, and ifthey are produced in a way that reduces net carbon emissions, they could contribute to mitigatingglobal climate change.Regarding non GHG environmental impacts, research suggests that production of biofuelfeedstocks, particularly food crops like corn and soy, could increase water pollution from nutrients,pesticides, and sediment. Increases in irrigation and ethanol refining could deplete aquifers. Airquality could also decline in some regions if the impact of biofuels on tailpipe emissions plus theadditional emissions generated at bio-refineries increases net conventional air pollution.Ethanol and biodiesel are two popular types of bio-fuels nowadays. Ethanol is used to mix withpetrol in varied ratios, including E5 (petrol containing five percent of ethanol), E10 (10 percent),E85 (85 percent) and E100 (100 percent).ethanol produced from grain can reduce 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions compared to thatproduced from petrol and up to 100 percent compared to that from cellulose and sugar cane;biodiesel can reduce 70 percent compared to diesel oil. The contents of other exhaust fumes such asCO, NOx, SOxand hydrocarbons all significantly decrease when using biofuel.Almost the entire national territory of Finland is located between 60 and 70 degrees northernlatitude, and a quarter of its surface area lies north of the Arctic Circle (Fig. 1). The mean annualtemperature in Southern Finland is 4 to 5C, in Lapland 2 to +3C. In January, the mean annualtemperature in the northern two thirds of the country is 10 and15C, in southern Finland it is 5to 10C. Even in southern Finland, 30% of the annual precipitation stems from snow, whichremains on the ground for about four months. Under the cold climate remarkable amounts of energyis needed for heating buildings. In the winter season, there is a very limited amount of full daylight,necessitating electric lighting until late morning and as of early afternoon. The growth season ofagricultural wood is four months long only, thus, it will minimise the production rate of biofuels.

Finland government has set a target that 10% of traffic fuels should consist of biofuel by 2020 -means Finland will get more production plants running as quickly as possible.


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How does renewable energy source benefit FinlandHow does a wind energy source benefit Finland

Impacts on Economy

In year 2009, the cost of wind power production without subsidiaries ranges from 60 to 80 eurodollars per megawatt hour. However, the average spot price of electricity by global suppliers for theEuropean region would only be 57 euros dollars per megawatt hour. To encourage the advancementof wind power industries, government would have to allocate funding to compete with commercial

industries in supplying electricity.While the implementation costs of wind energy requires subsidies to compete, wind power industryhas brought about positive economic impacts particularly within two areas, the economic turnoverof Finland and its employment rate. To date, an economic turnover of 0.8 billion euro dollars peryear has been generated. However, with the advancement of current technologies being expanded,the technology industry expects an increase of the economic turnover to 3 billion euro dollars peryear in year 2020. Consequently, the global market shares were estimated to increase, giving aneconomic turnover of 12 to 14 billion euro dollars per year.Currently, there are more than 20 companies involved in the wind power industry which is supportsmore than 3,000 employees. The expected growth in employment could increase up to 14,000 to36,000 people in year 2020.

That being said, the projected turnover could be the key to overcome the underlying relations of thedeficit in funding towards research and development for wind power industry.

Reduction of Carbon Dioxide Emission

According to an article by CleanTechnica, carbon dioxide emissions are reduced by wind farms inthe overall electrical grid of 1:1 basis. While the use of fossil fuels, nuclear and other commercialforms of energy produces an average of 800g of CO2per kilowatt hour, virtually no CO2is producedthrough the use of wind energy.From an article provided by CleanTechnia, many people have thinks that the concrete required forthe base of constructing a wind turbine emits so much of CO 2that wind turbines will never be ableto pay back the carbon tech.A full lifecycle cost analysis of carbon to cradle-to-grave report from CleanTechinca shows that,the concrete used to build wind farms obeys ISO standards, whereby regardless of its mega size, theISO standard will be followed. From the report, it is stated that the amount of concrete used in windturbine bases is equivalent to the amount of concrete used to build 6 detached home for foundations.

Modern wind turbines are typically in the 2-3 MW range, with much larger ones offshore and largerones often considered for most wind farms. Assuming 2.5 MW average for a modern wind turbine,this would require about 400 wind turbines to enable a Gigawatt of generation capacity, resulting inabout 2,400 homes equivalent, not 30,000 homes worth, as some have asserted. If you scaled up forapartments, townhomes and bungalows, you might get to 6,000 homes, but nowhere near 30,000.

So not only do wind turbines not use unusual amounts of concrete, it is included in the apples-to-

apples comparisons that show that with the concrete bases, wind energy is still enormously betterthan fossil fuel generation alternatives.

Statistics Finland has provided us statics of carbon dioxide emission for Finland from 1990 up to2012.


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From the graph above, we are able to see a major decrease of emission of carbon dioxide since2010. This is because in 2011, a feed-in-tariff was implemented for renewable energy wherebysubsidies will be provided to those who are using renewable energy sources. With the support andoffer from the government, the people of Finland supported the use of renewable energy sourceswhich greatly decreases the usage of non-renewable fossil fuels. This results in the great decrease ofcarbon dioxide emission.From the report, it was seen that the largest drop of emission of carbon dioxide falls upon the energysector, where the decrease of carbon dioxide from the energy section was up to 5.5 million tonnes

which is equivalent to 10% reduction of carbon dioxide emission per year.

How does biofuel energy source benefits Finland

Impact on F in land's economy:

Recent studies have shown that the local economic impacts of corn-based ethanol facilities aresmall. This is because the corn they utilise would otherwise be sold to other markets, so the impacton corn price is modest. Finland are particularly well placed to capture the economic impact of anemerging biofuels industry for the reason of its "biomass belt" states as plants will undoubtedly belocated near the feedstock sources. The potential economic development contributions of anemerging biofuels industry are particularly significant because many of the areas where such an

industry could concentrate on the not-distant-past faced adverse economic and demographic trends.An emerging biofuels industry could offer new jobs that would help to support rural communities inFinland and farm households and provide the kind of economic stimulus many agriculturallydependent area have been seeking. Furthermore, the sheer scope of the potential development inFinland, with capital cost of $34billion and annual regional operational expenditures of over$10billion suggest that a biofuels industry could change the economic and demographic makeup ofFinland.Policy makers in Finland have examined the benefits of supplementing a bio fuels subsidy with acarbon tax. While the carbon tax revenue can be used in part to finance the subsidy, the negativeeffects of a carbon tax on food prices and social welfare could also be exacerbated in the presence ofother policies to support biofuels. Additionally, by promoting more biofuel production, the carbon

tax could increase distortionary expenditures by the government on the subsidy.By developing a framework that assumes that the consumers derive utility from leisure, miles, andfood, and disutility from GHG emissions and miles related externalities such as: congestion,accidents and air pollution. Miles are produced from fuel which consists of gasoline and biofuel.Land use as input is limited to the production of biofuels and food while all produced goods uselabour as an input. The government will obtains revenue by taxing labour, emissions and miles. Thepolicy experiment considered is a revenue neutral increase in the carbon tax rate, with revenuesfrom the carbon tax used to reduce the labour tax rate.


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We also consider a scenario with a fixed biofuel subsidy and analyze its implications for the optimalcarbon tax and labour tax. In addition, we also examine the effect of a marginal increase in thesubsidy rate, holding revenue fixed but allowing the labour tax to vary. We develop a numericalgeneral equilibrium model to determine the magnitude of second best optimal carbon tax, as well asthe market and welfare impacts of the carbon tax and biofuel subsidy.Implementation of biofuels economic polices is complex due to diversity of interests and concerns.Finland utilizing approaches to economy policy design with the common goals o supporting biofuelsdevelopment and economic growth, protecting the environment, and increasing energy security.

Biofuels Impact on carbon dioxide percentage reduction:

As many environment agencies are concern on the potential environmental and social implications,its continued growth of biofuels must be recognised. For example, reduced greenhouse gasemissions are among the explicit goals of some policy measures to support biofuels production.Until recently, many Scientist assumed that the replacement of fossil fuels with bio-fuels wouldhave positive and significant climate-change effects by generating lower levels of the greenhouse-gases that contribute to global warming. Bioenergy crops can offset greenhouse-gases emissions bydirectly removing carbon dioxide from the air as they grow and storing it in crop biomass and soil.In addition tobiofuels,many of these crops generate co-products such as protein for animal feed,thus saving energy that would have been used to make feed by others mean.

Some of the side-effects of agricultural biofuels production such as unintended negative impacts onland, water and biodiversity are of particular concern with respect to biofuels. The extents of suchimpacts depend on how biofuels feedstock are produced and processed, the scale of production and,how they influence land-usage. Scientific studies have revealed that different biofuels vary widelyin their greenhouse gas balance when compared to petrol. Depending much on the ways used toproduce the feedstock and process the fuel, some crops can even generate more greenhouse gasesthan dofossil fuels. For example, nitrous oxide is a greenhouse gas which its global warmingpotential is 300 times greater than carbon dioxide which is released from nitrogenfertilisers. Furthermore, at other stage of the production of biofuels, greenhouse gases will releasewhen producing the fertilisers, pesticides and fuel used in farming, during chemical processing,transport and distribution.
http://www.greenfacts.org/glossary/abc/bio-fuels.htmhttp://www.greenfacts.org/glossary/def/fossil-fuel.htmhttp://www.greenfacts.org/glossary/def/fossil-fuel.htmhttp://www.greenfacts.org/glossary/abc/bio-fuels.htm


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Reference:1. Sren Juel Petersen, Klaus Jacob Jensen (e.g. 2011). Offshore wind turbines are setting new

records. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.ramboll.com/megatrend/feature-articles/offshore-wind-turbines-are-setting-new-records. [Last Accessed 29 July 2014].

2. Christian Llull (e.g. 2011). Wind Energy in Finland. [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.abowind.com/com/wind-energy/finland.html. [Last Accessed 29 July 2014].

3.

Catherine Early (1 June 2013). Harnessing wind energy in icy climes. [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1183991/harnessing-wind-energy-icy-climes. [LastAccessed 29 July 2014].

4. Mike Barnard (7 May 2014). Wind Power Cuts CO2 Emissions On Close To 1:1 Basis .[ONLINE] Available at: http://cleantechnica.com/2014/05/07/wind-power/. [Last Accessed 29July 2014].

5. Patricia Weis-Taylor, Sophia Latorre, (July 2013). Finland. IEA WIND 2012 ANNUALREPORT. (e.g. 2), pp.90-96

6.

International Energy Agency, (July 2013). Technology Road Map. Wind Energy . e.g. 32 (),pp.21-22

7. 1. T Kuhn, M Pickhardt(2009). Biofuels, Innovation, and Endogenous Growth: SustainableEnergy, Indirect Land use Change, Energy Policy.

8. 2. K Sunde, A Brekke, B Solberg(2011). Environmental impacts and costs of liquid biofuels:assessment of three biodiesel fuels- (1)transesterified lipids, (2)hydrotreated vegetable oils,(3)woody biomass to liquid.

9. 3. S Visnen, T Valtonen(2012). Biogenic carbon emissions of integrated ethanol production:Present greenhouse gas study results for biofuels produced with forest residue or utilisation ofpulp wood

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4. A Nyh, S Horn(2012). Environmental sustainability- aspects and criteria in forestbiorefineries: examine what kind of criteria should be applied to an evaluation of environmentalsustainability in the forest biorefineries.

11.5. Searchinger, T., R. Heimlich, R. Houghton(2008). Use of Finland croplands for biofuelsincreases greenhouse gases through emiss ions from land-use change.

12.6. J. Kola, M. Nokkala (Eds), 1999. Structural policy Effects in Finnish Rural Area: AQuantitative Social Accounting Matrix Approach.

13.7. A Agostini,J Giuntoli, A Boulamanti, (2013). Carbon Accounting of Forest Bioenergy:Consequences of increased production of wood based energy on the carbon balance in Finland.

14.8. A Demirbas, (2007). Importance of biodiesel as transportation fuel: To examine how thescarcity of known petroleum reserves will make renewable energy resources.
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Documents

Group 18 - Finland