A recent Japanese study titled “Biomethanol Production and CO2 Emission Reduction” concludes:
This study demonstrates that the practical oxidation reaction during gasification of readily available biomass materials could be optimized for methanol production, yielding ca. 40 to 60% of dry weight. This opens the way to utilization of a wide range of harvested plant material low in sugar and starch, including byproducts of other processing operations such as sawdust, bran, straw and husks of rice. Sawdust, rice bran and rice husks are particularly attractive biofuel resources since factories
already produce large quantities.The potentially positive economic impact of biomethanol production on Japanese farming and social systems from planting grasses and trees in unutilized land is immense. Reduced CO2 emissions, recycling of abandoned upland and paddy field and woodland in mountainous areas, and recycling of wastes of agricultural products would all be possible by promoting biofuel production systems based on this new method of gasification. This
technology is particularly attractive since biomethanol can be produced from a wide range of biomass raw materials.
Another interesting presentation:
North Carolina Animal WAste as a Potential Resource for Reducing CO2 and Methane Emissions—note the diagram showing production of methanol from biogas. If new cars were flex fuel vehicles warranteed to operate on ethanol, methanol, and gasoline, that methanol could then be used directly to fuel cars.
One more, hot off the press, by Kristiina Vogt et al:
Bio-methanol: How energy choices in the western United States can help mitigate global climate change: “As a gasoline substitute, bio-methanol can optimally reduce vehicle C emissions by 2–29 Tg of C (23–81% of the total emitted by each state). [...]In the state of Washington, thinning “high-fire-risk†small stems, namely 5.1–22.9 cm diameter trees, from wildfire-prone forests and using them to produce methanol for electricity generation with fuel cells would avoid C emissions of 3.7–7.3 Mg C/ha. Alternatively, when wood-methanol produced from the high-fire-risk wood is used as a gasoline substitute, 3.3–6.6 Mg C/ha of carbon emissions are avoided. If these same “high-fire-risk†woody stems were burned during a wildfire 7.9 Mg C/ha would be emitted in the state of Washington alone. Although detailed economic analyses of producing methanol from biomass are in its infancy, we believe that converting biomass into methanol and substituting it for fossil-fuel-based energy production is a viable option in locations that have high biomass availability.”