Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 205 N. Mathews Avenue, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States.
DOE Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1206 W. Gregory Drive, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States.
Environ Sci Technol. 2023 Feb 14;57(6):2262-2271. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.2c07936. Epub 2023 Feb 2.
Cellulosic biofuels are part of a portfolio of solutions to address climate change; however, their production remains expensive and federal policy interventions (e.g., Renewable Fuel Standard) have not spurred broad construction of cellulosic biorefineries. A range of state-level interventions have also been enacted, but their implications for the financial viability of biorefineries are not well understood. To address this gap, this study evaluated the efficacy of 20 state-level tax incentives from 14 states and their interactions with other location-specific economic parameters (e.g., state income tax rates, electricity prices). To characterize implications of location-specific policies and parameters on biorefinery cash flows, we developed a new BioSTEAM Location-Specific Evaluation (BLocS) module for the open-source software BioSTEAM. Leveraging BLocS and BioSTEAM, we characterized the minimum ethanol selling price (MESP) for a cellulosic biorefinery (using corn stover as feedstock) and two conventional biorefineries (using corn or sugarcane as feedstock) for comparison. Among state-specific scenarios, nonincentivized MESPs for the corn stover biorefinery ranged from 0.74 $·L (4.20 $·gallon gasoline equivalent [gge]) [0.69-0.79 $·L; 3.91-4.48 $·gge; Oklahoma] to 1.02 $·L (5.78 $·gge) [0.95-1.09 $·L; 5.39-6.18 $·gge; New York], while the tax incentive-induced MESP reduction ranged from negligible (Virginia) to 5.78% [5.43-6.20%; Iowa]. Ultimately, this work can inform the design of policy incentives for biorefineries under specific deployment contexts.
纤维素生物燃料是应对气候变化的一系列解决方案的一部分；然而，其生产成本仍然很高，联邦政策干预（如可再生燃料标准）并没有推动大规模建设纤维素生物精炼厂。一系列州级干预措施也已经实施，但它们对生物精炼厂财务可行性的影响还不太清楚。为了解决这一差距，本研究评估了来自 14 个州的 20 项州级税收激励措施的效果，以及它们与其他特定于地点的经济参数（如州所得税税率、电价）的相互作用。为了描述特定于地点的政策和参数对生物精炼厂现金流的影响，我们为开源软件 BioSTEAM 开发了一个新的 BioSTEAM 特定地点评估（BLocS）模块。利用 BLocS 和 BioSTEAM，我们对以玉米秸秆为原料的纤维素生物精炼厂（以玉米秸秆为原料）和两个以玉米或甘蔗为原料的传统生物精炼厂的最低乙醇销售价格（MESP）进行了特征描述，以便进行比较。在特定于州的情况下，未受激励的玉米秸秆生物精炼厂的 MESP 从 0.74 $·L（4.20 $·加仑汽油当量[gge]）[0.69-0.79 $·L；3.91-4.48 $·gge；俄克拉荷马州]到 1.02 $·L（5.78 $·gge）[0.95-1.09 $·L；5.39-6.18 $·gge；纽约州]，而税收激励引起的 MESP 降低幅度从微不足道（弗吉尼亚州）到 5.78%[5.43-6.20%；爱荷华州]。最终，这项工作可以为特定部署环境下的生物精炼厂政策激励措施的设计提供信息。
