Electricity from Wood Waste: Integrating Energy and Environmental Analysis in British Columbia

While some of the wood waste produced by the forest industry in British Columbia is used to cogenerate process steam and electricity in pulp and paper mills, substantial excess quantities of this material are burned with no attempt to capture energy released during incineration. If 50% of the current wood waste surplus were instead used to produce electricity from condensing turbines, approximately 4280 gigawatt hours per year of electricity could be obtained. If the electricity were exported to the United States and thereby prevented the construction of a fossil fuel burning thermal electricity plant in the US, the results would include direct economic benefits to British Columbia as well as global environmental benefits.