Conference article

Agriculture has the potential to supply large amounts of biomass for renewable energy production from residues from traditional crop production and from dedicated energy crops. This renewable energy production has significant potential to contribute to the reduction of GHG emissions in the energy sector by using ethanol and biodiesel to displace petroleum based liquid fuels and direct burning of biomass to displace coal for generating electricity. To quantify this biomass potential; we used the Canadian Economic and Emissions Model for Agriculture to estimate renewable energy production from biomass and the impact on agricultural production. We used two scenarios: the first scenario that looks at a combination of market incentives and mandates; and a second scenario that looks at only market incentives. The results show that: in the markets and mandates scenario; biomass production is higher; both ethanol and electricity are required to take place and land use change occurs. Agriculture has significant potential to generate biomass for energy under different scenarios; the incentive mix can have a large impact on the type of bioenergy produced; there is significant potential for GHG emission reductions and there is potential for unintended GHG effects; such as the increased clearing of land for crop production.

Bioenergy; Policy; Agriculture; Greenhouse gas emissions; Land use change