Accelerate Large-Scale Biomass Residue Utilization via Cofiring to Help China Achieve Its 2030 Carbon-Peaking Goals

Littleresearch exists on the role of cofiring to nationalcarbon goals, saved stranded assets, and needed policy supports. Thisstudy reports significant opportunities for carbon mitigation, residualbiomass utilization, and economic feasibility via cofiring. Cofiring biomass with coal for power generation is anaffordableand ready-to-deploy technology to help reduce carbon emissions andresolve residual biomass. Cofiring has not been widely applied inChina primarily because of some practical limitations, i.e., biomassaccessibility, technological and economic constraints, and lack ofpolicy support. We identified the benefits of cofiring with considerationof these practical limitations based on Integrated Assessment Models.We found that China produces 1.82 Bts/year of biomass residues, 45%of which is waste. 48% of the unused biomass can be utilized withoutfiscal intervention and 70% can be utilized with the subsidized Feed-in-Tariffsfor biopower and carbon trading. The average Marginal Abatement Costof cofiring is twice that of China's current carbon price.Cofiring can help China create 153 billion yuan of farmers'income annually and reduce 5.3 Bts of Committed Cumulative CarbonEmissions (CCCEs, 2023-2030), contributing to the needed CCCEmitigations to China's overall sector and the power sectorby 32 and 86%, respectively. About 201 GW of coal-fired fleets arenot compliant with China's 2030 carbon-peaking goals, and 127GW can be saved by implementing cofiring, representing 9.6% of thetotal fleets in 2030.