Over the past 5 years, McNeil Technologies staff have performed numerous feasibilitystudies for utilizing biomass from forest thinning projects for energy production. Thepurpose of this paper is to identify common themes and lessons learned from conductingthese studies throughout the western United States of America (USA). Specific topics tobe addressed include, lack of data and data reliability, impacts of biomass costs on theeconomic feasibility, fuel supply risk, challenges associated with developing small scaleplants (< 5 MW), impacts of current wholesale electric and natural gas prices oneconomic feasibility, and common concerns of environmental groups and their impact onimplementation of thinning and biomass production. Typically, large biomass plants mustbe built to take advantage of economies of scale in terms of lower per unit capital andoperating costs and improved conversion efficiencies. However, large plants havesignificant fuel supply requirements, thereby making it difficult to obtain sufficient long-termfuel supplies at a reasonable cost from forest thinning operations. Development ofsmall-scale community based biomass systems offers less risk in terms of fuel supply, butthe per unit economics and efficiency of small systems present barriers. The lack of longterm planning data by federal, state and local land management agencies hinders thedevelopment of long term fuel supply assessments, which in turn increases the fuelsupply risk of biomass plants and reduces investor confidence.
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