Wood pellets are one of the leading renewable and sustainable solution for meeting the demands for the global clean energy transformation. While much of the production and consumption of these pellets occurs in developed economies, there is an increasing opportunity for producing pellets from a variety of available biomass sources in emerging economies in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Not for overseas heat and power but for local clean cooking.
Access to clean and affordable energy for cooking lags well behind the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 target of providing access to clean energy to all by 2030. This is a global challenge with negative health and environmental impacts that cost the world about US$2 trillion per year, according to a World Bank study conducted in 2020.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that over 2.6 billion people worldwide (2018) still lack access to modern and clean cooking solutions of which almost 900 million are in Sub-Saharan African countries, the only region in the world where access to clean cooking solutions has not kept pace with population growth.
Biomass pellets offer a tangible solution
However, there is an increasing opportunity for producing biomass pellets from available agro- and forest residues in emerging economies in Asia, Africa, and Latin America for use in heating, electricity as well as cooking.
In the latter, biomass pellets coupled with modern cooking appliances offer a tangible and equitable solution to several SDGs including health.
Recognizing this, the World Bioenergy Association (WBA) has selected advanced biomass cooking as a key focal area of engagement and has launched a Working Group on Advanced Biomass Cooking (ABC) that brings together actors from around the world engaged in Advanced Biomass Cooking.
Amongst other things, the ABC Working Group will host a webinar ‘Pellet plants in developing economies – Experiences of project developers’ on April 12, 2022, the second in a series on advanced biomass cooking.
In this free-to-attend webinar, project developers from Africa, Asia, and Latin America will share their experiences in planning, building, and operating biomass pellet facilities in these regions offering unique insights into a nascent biomass pellet market that has the potential to get SDG 7, and others, back on track.
