Everything You Need To Know About Bioenergy
Indonesia is endowed with a variety of energy resources, both fossil and renewable. The main resources for electricity generation are fossil energy, such as oil, gas and coal. Indonesia derives the vast majority of its energy consumption from fossil fuels. From 95% of fossil fuels energy consumption, fossil oil consumption is 52%.
As we all may know, energy is a basic requirement for everyday life. If the level of dependence on energy is very high, what if someday that energy runs out? This is the exact reason why we need to switch to bioenergy which is more sustainable. The raw materials are always available for sustainable reproduction. Using bioenergy means that we contribute in meeting the goals of national energy policies by minimizing consumption of fossil energy and maximizing renewable energy.
Bioenergy is one of many forms of renewable energy that is derived from recently living organic materials known as biomass. The fuel sources can be regrown or resupplied, and as long as efforts are made to maintain biomass resources, the process can be relied upon as a sustainable method of renewable energy production. And as well as being renewable, sustainable biomass production is carbon neutral, which means that it doesn’t release any extra carbon into the atmosphere.
Quoting the statement by Dr. Ir. Retno Gumilang Dewi M.Env.Eng.Sc. in the Bioenergy and Biorefinery conference event at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Singapore, there are several bioenergy that are potential to be developed in Indonesia:
- Biodiesel, to replace petroleum-based diesel.
- Bioethanol, as a substitute for petroleum-based gasoline.
- Biokerosene, to replace petroleum-based kerosene.
- Pure Plant Oil (PPO), to replace diesel in power plants.
The use of biodiesel is allegedly able to absorb a lot of workers, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve environmental quality, stabilize CPO prices and be able to increase the added value of the downstream palm oil industry. With its enormous bioenergy potential, Indonesia has the opportunity for realizing better energy security and environmental quality.
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