Perspectives on Biomass-to-Power for a Circular Bioeconomy in Taiwan

To mitigate the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) from fossil fuel combustion, biomass-to-power development via biochemical or thermochemical pathways has been recognized as a sustainable route for advancing towards a society based on a circular bioeconomy. The key differences between these pathways lie in operating temperature, process design capacity, feedstock characteristics and primary products. The biochemical route focuses on specific biofuels (e.g., biogas), and the thermochemical route often offers broader energy forms like heat and electricity. This perspective paper updates Taiwan’s achievements of its installed capacity and power (electricity) generation over a period of five years (2020–2024) under regulatory promotion that echoes official policies for sustainable development goals (SDGs) and 2050 carbon neutrality. Furthermore, the challenges of the biomass-to-power development in Taiwan (especially biogas-to-power systems) are addressed in the present study. These key issues include biomass resource, promotion incentives, stationary air pollution, site land use requirements and units for meeting performance durability requirements. Based on installed capacity, the main findings showed that biomass-to-power systems using biochemical routes (i.e., anaerobic digestion) in Taiwan showed an increasing trend, as well as increasing results for those using thermochemical routes (direct combustion, gasification). Furthermore, the data on total power generation indicated an upward trend from 201.7 Gigawatt-hour (GWh) in 2021 to 237.7 GWh in 2024, regardless of the kind of route used, whether biochemical or thermochemical. In conclusion, biomass-to-power systems have provided sustainable waste management and a circular bioeconomy model in Taiwan, which can be linked to the targets of sustainable development goals (SDGs) like SDG-7 (i.e., affordable and clean energy) and SDG-12 (i.e., responsible consumption and production).