China has opened eight biomass plants in five leading
grain-producing provinces to cut carbon dioxide emissions and
generate electricity, amid growing concerns over greenhouse gas and
climate change.
The plants, with a total capacity of 200,000 kilowatts, are
expected to burn 1.6 million tons of grain stalks a year.
They will generate 1.4 billion kilowatt hours of electricity,
said Cui Mengshan, a planning and business development manager with
the National Bio Energy Co Ltd, a subsidiary of the State Grid
Corporation.
"Compared with coal-fired power plants, these biomass projects
are expected to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 800,000 tons a
year," he said.
China has been turning grain stalks into clean energy since last
December when the State Grid Corporation launched the first biomass
plant in the eastern Shandong Province.
The project, which burns 200,000 tons of stalks annually, has
enabled local farmers to profit from what was traditionally
waste.
Similar projects have been launched over the past year in four
other grain-producing provinces of Hebei, Jiangsu, Henan and
Heilongjiang.
China's capacity for bio-energy electricity is forecast to reach
5.5 million kilowatts by 2010, according to the country's 11th
Five-Year Plan (2006-10).
"This means China's carbon dioxide emissions will be reduced by
2,200 tons by then," Cui said.
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(Xinhua News Agency December 5, 2007)
