Societal Techno-Economic Assessment of Biochar Production and Use as Soil Amendment

Abstract

The current research aims to determine whether the production of biochar and its use as a soil amendment is desirable from a societal point of view. This means that external effects are included, in addition to the private benefits to the biochar producer. Therefore, the production of biochar from two biomass residue streams (medium-density fiberboard and tree bark) and its application as a soil amendment are evaluated using a societal techno-economic assessment. In a societal techno-economic assessment, all three pillars of sustainability should be considered, i.e., the economic, environmental, and social aspects. The indicators for these pillars are measured in different units, and to integrate all aspects for decision-making, they are converted into monetary values using shadow prices. We find that, when integrating environmental and economic indicators of sustainability, the production of biochar from tree bark is desirable from a societal point of view because the net present value to society is greater than zero. For medium-density fiberboard, the desirability is dependent on the inclusion of the previous life cycle. We note that social indicators of sustainability are not included in this study.