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ECONOMICS OF PRODUCING FUEL PELLETS FROM BIOMASS
Published by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, St. Joseph, Michigan www.asabe.org
Citation: Applied Engineering in Agriculture. Vol. 22(3): 421-426. @2006
Authors: S. Mani, S. Sokhansanj, X. Bi, A. Turhollow
Keywords: Pelletization costs, Cost analysis, Wood pellets, Solid fuels
An engineering economic analysis of a biomass pelleting process was performed for conditions in North America.
The pelletization of biomass consists of a series of unit operations: drying, size reduction, densifying, cooling, screening, and
warehousing. Capital and operating cost of the pelleting plant was estimated at several plant capacities. Pellet production
cost for a base case plant capacity of 6 t/h was about $51/t of pellets. Raw material cost was the largest cost element of the
total pellet production cost followed by personnel cost, drying cost, and pelleting mill cost. An increase in raw material cost
substantially increased the pellet production cost. Pellet plants with a capacity of more than 10 t/h decreased the costs to
roughly $40/t of pellets. Five different burner fuels – wet sawdust, dry sawdust, biomass pellets, natural gas, and coal were
tested for their effect on the cost of pellet production. Wet sawdust and coal, the cheapest burner fuels, produced the lowest
pellet production cost. The environmental impacts due to the potential emissions of these fuels during the combustion process
require further investigation.
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