Optimizing Calliandra Energy Plantations for Energy, Food and Feed, Is It Possible?

Calliandra energy plantations as the name implies are indeed prioritized or for the main purpose of producing energy from biomass, either wood pellets or just wood chips. This is because wood is the main product of the energy plantation, while leaves and flower nectar are by-products or are considered waste from the wood pellet or wood chip business. However, if the use of leaves for animal feed and flower nectar for honey production has an economic value that approaches or even exceeds the wood pellet product, then it will be a different story. Calliandra leaves, like indigofera leaves and glicidia / gamal leaves, have a high protein content, while this protein element is the most expensive source of nutrition of all the elements in animal feed products, while calliandra honey is one of the best quality honeys compared to other honey products such as acacia honey, kapok honey, rubber honey and so on.

Synchronization between honey and wood production is very important in the energy plantation to maximize profit. In honey production, the first time the calliandra flowers and the next flower cycle are very important. Don't let it be that just because of ignorance of the flower cycle, many benefits that should have been obtained are lost. In addition, for sustainable and optimal honey production, not only calliandra nectar is needed, but also a number of certain plants as support, both for additional bee feed and for making beehives. When all that is available is calliandra nectar, honey production will be maximized but will not be sustainable because the bee colony will shrink and then disappear. This is the importance of plantation engineering with a number of species or types of certain plants if honey production is also an important product in the calliandra plantation-based business.

Calliandra leaves in abundance will automatically be obtained when the calliandra trees are cut down or harvested. The calliandra leaves need to be separated from the wood and twigs to be used for animal feed. Animal feed products from calliandra leaves can be in the form of fresh leaves or processed leaves in the form of pellets, or hay. This makes it possible to have a leaf pellet factory in addition to the wood pellet factory. With an estimated leaf volume of 1/4 of the wood but the price of leaf pellets is around 3 times the price of wood pellets. So the profit from utilizing leaves into pellets (leaf pellets) is very large, estimated at 1/2 to 3/4 of the wood pellet turnover. This is certainly a serious consideration and cannot be ignored.

A comprehensive understanding of calliandra plantations for energy, food and feed is indeed very important to maximize profits from calliandra plantation-based businesses. This will encourage the calliandra energy plantation to grow further. In addition, the legality aspect and land selection for the location of the calliandra plantation. This is because, especially for wood pellet products in general, it is for export orientation and especially for Japan and Europe, environmental or sustainability certification is very important and even required so that the legality aspect (which is clear and clean) and land selectivity according to its designation including the history of the land are also very important. So optimizing calliandra energy plantations for energy, food and feed is possible if the terms and conditions are met.

Unlike Honeybees, Why Does the Development of Energy Plantations Get Little Attention from the Goat/Sheep and Cattle Livestock Industry?

Along with the global decarbonization trend, energy plantations are increasingly developing in Indonesia. The creation of these energy plantations has the main purpose of producing biomass fuels such as wood chips and wood pellets. Wood chip production because it is easier and the production equipment is easier and cheaper is usually done before wood pellet production and for more details can be read here. In addition to the use of wood as the main product of energy plantations, by-products that can be produced from energy plantations are animal feed from the use of leaves and honey from honey bee farms. And with the utilization of all parts of the tree (whole tree utilization), the energy plantation-based business is not only more profitable, but can also remain sustainable.

The honey production that can be produced from the development of energy plantations will also be very large, namely tons or even hundreds to thousands of tons in proportion to the area of ​​the energy plantation. Moreover, the plants cultivated are red calliandra whose nectar will produce one of the best quality honey. Regarding the development of the energy plantation, even API (Indonesian Beekeeping Association) responded optimistically to the development of the energy plantation, because in the next 5 years it is targeted that honey production will increase by 300% so that the import of tens of thousands of tons of honey from China can be reduced and even be sufficient, more details read here. In addition to honey, several derivative products will also be produced from honey bee farming, namely royal jelly, bee pollen, bee wax and bee venom which also have many benefits. The motto "Gertakanlah" namely the Bee Feed Planting Movement is very much in line with the development of this energy plantation.

But this condition is different from the world of animal husbandry, especially ruminant livestock, namely goats/sheep and cattle. In fact, Indonesia's meat needs are also very large, most of which are still met by imports. Unlike beekeeping which is responsive to the development of the global decarbonization trend, namely more specifically with the energy plantation, the world or livestock industry players have not responded to this, even though the production of feed from this energy plantation will also be very large. Even the main element of animal feed from red calliandra leaves is protein and protein is the most expensive element of animal feed nutrition. In addition, with this livestock, it is also possible for integration to occur as in the diagram above. Integration will provide optimal benefits and production becomes efficient, thus providing even greater benefits.

Stationary Auger : Industrial Pyrolysis for Indonesia and SE Asia

Global biochar production in 2023 is estimated to reach 350 thousand tons or equivalent to 600,000 carbon credits and is expected to continue to increase. From an economic perspective, revenues from biochar producers, distributors, value-added producers and equipment manufacturers exceeded $600 million in 2023, with a CAGR of 97% between 2021 and 2023. Revenues are projected to grow to nearly $3.3 billion in 2025. The existence of carbon credits is the second largest motivation for biochar production. With the existence of carbon credits, there has been a significant increase in biochar production from before. In 2023, this biochar carbon credit contributed the largest amount, namely 90% of carbon removal in the voluntary carbon market according to data from cdr.fyi.

And even biochar production where the income from direct sales of biochar is not that big or in other words they rely on income from biochar production then it is still a profitable business. As a tropical country, Indonesia can be said to be a biomass heaven both from agricultural / plantation biomass or forestry. If the biomass is converted into biochar then the production will be very large as well as the carbon credit. Direct sales of biochar (physical biochar) can also be done well because there are so many sub-optimal lands that can be repaired or upgraded using biochar, such as dry lands, critical lands, post-mining lands and so on, which amount to tens or even hundreds of millions of hectares.

Nearly 80% of biochar producers in 2023 will fall into the medium, large, and very large categories

The selection of production equipment that can produce certified biochar so that it can get carbon credit is important besides maximizing production capacity, it requires adequate production equipment. Stationary auger pyrolysis equipment is the right choice to meet the above requirements. In addition to producing biochar as the main product, by-products such as excess heat, biooil and syngas are additional benefits of the pyrolysis process with the stationary auger. The utilization and monetization of these by-products are an increasing driving force for biochar production with the stationary auger. Currently, there are still many biochar producers who do not have certification or standards for carbon credit, this also makes them unable to get income from carbon credit or just business as usual with biochar sales. Of course, this is not attractive to companies that will produce large-capacity biochar.

But why is biochar production in Indonesia and Southeast Asia still very small and not many people even know about biochar? This is related to low awareness of climate, sustainability and the environment and more specifically to biochar. Biochar as a solution to improve soil fertility so that productivity increases (both agricultural/plantation crops and forestry) as well as a climate solution with carbon sequestration. But with the high problem of climate awareness, sustainability and the environment, especially with the economic driving force in the form of carbon credits, it seems that the story will be different in the coming years. But there are indeed reasons related to the low participation of biochar producers in the carbon market, namely the costs and difficulties in obtaining certificates to sell carbon credits, as well as the costs of participating in carbon marketplaces. But with the large production capacity of industrial capacity with stationary auger equipment, the costs and difficulties in obtaining carbon credits will be commensurate with the benefits obtained.

If We Don’t Cut Emissions, Creating Carbon Sinks is Irrelevant

The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is already high so it must be reduced to save the earth. Efforts to reduce the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere apparently cannot simply absorb CO2 from the atmosphere (carbon capture and storage). Maximizing the absorption of atmospheric CO2 but on the other hand CO2 emissions continue to increase, it will be very difficult (read: impossible) to reduce the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, let alone to a certain target agreed upon by the global community. So what makes sense is that CO2 emissions are not increased again so that the concentration does not increase further and existing CO2 is reduced to a certain level as targeted.

In practice, the production of wood chips and wood pellets as carbon neutral renewable fuels will complement each other with biochar. Wood chips and wood pellets do not add CO2 emissions and biochar absorbs CO2 as a carbon sink (carbon sequestration) or carbon negative. The application of biochar as part of carbon capture and storage (CCS) is currently developing the fastest compared to other CO2 reduction efforts (CDR / Carbon Dioxide Removal). Biochar leads in CDR credits in the voluntary carbon market (VCM), namely with more than 90% globally in 2023 as stated in the cdr.fyi database. From this data, it is estimated that at least 350 thousand tons of biochar have been produced globally in 2023 with an estimated 600,000 units or more of CDR credits (Carbon Credit).

And as in Europe, namely in 2023 there are a total of 48 new biochar plants, installed and operating, although 7 plants are closed, but a total of 41 biochar plants or an estimated total of 171 biochar plants are operating. And in 2024 there are an estimated 51 new biochar plants in Europe or in 2024 the total number of biochar plants is estimated to grow to more than 220 units. In terms of biochar volume, there is an estimated increase of 75,000 tons in 2023 and in 2024 the increase in production to 115,000 tons. Electricity production with 100% biomass fuel and equipped with carbon capture and storage (CCS) devices will also absorb CO2 or carbon negative, but this method is expensive and slow to develop. While biomass and coal cofiring because the cofiring ratio is small, efforts to reduce CO2 emissions are not too significant but cofiring is indeed the easiest entry point for using renewable energy in , especially in the energy or power generation sector (coal power plants). And in the end, creating a carbon sink, but the emission source is not reduced (cut), then it is the same as a lie or an irrelevant effort.

Wood Chip Production First, Then Wood Pellets

Many biomass energy entrepreneurs start their business with wood chip production. This is quite reasonable because in addition to the easy production process, cheap investment in equipment and easy market. But over time to increase profits, wood pellet production becomes an option. Technically, wood pellet production requires a series of equipment more than wood chip production, even wood chip production can be one of the stages of the overall wood pellet production process, namely the size reduction stage, especially if the raw material for wood pellets is from logs or pieces of wood. The wood pellet production process is more complex, production equipment is more expensive but also provides better profit expectations. This is certainly a driving force in itself and is considered commensurate between the costs incurred and the profits obtained.

Wood chip and wood pellet products also have the same use, namely for fuel or energy sources. With experience in the wood chip business, it will also provide experience in the dynamics of the renewable energy business, especially biomass energy. Along with the high awareness and demand for renewable energy, especially energy from biomass, a number of fossil energy companies have begun to develop renewable energy as an effort to the energy transition. And a justice energy transition with gradual implementation is the best route, for more details read here. In addition, wood chip production that requires a certain particle size will also produce waste (undersize) that can be used for wood pellet production, for more details read here.