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• Marginable economics for converting biomass to electricity and other byproducts. • Mallee production which is generally regarded as non-core business in a cereal cropping farming enterprise. • The Mallee tree is particularly difficult to harvest and process cost effectively owing to its physical characteristics and plant layout. The structure of an industry and its participants will affect the supply chain. For example the Australian sugar industry is structured with predominately family owned farms, and a range of ownership structures for harvesting. Cooperative or company owned mills are responsible for cane transport, the manufacture of sugar and other products, and now, with a deregulated environment, for contracting storage, marketing and shipping. This means that there are many profit centres with each centre and sector seeking to maximise its income and minimise its costs (SRDC 2006b). Individual sector goals, however, may impose costs across the entire value chain such that whole-of-system profitability is not maximised. Opportunities exist, therefore, for more integrated management of the value chain to enhance revenue and cost efficiency for the benefit of all industry participants (SRDC 2006b). A key driver in the cane industry has been a cane payment formula based on quality of the product delivered, which is impacted by operation of the supply chain in terms of delivery delays and impurities from the field. The Mallee Industry in Western Australia is largely structured around independent wheat farmers who have no strong links to biomass markets and processors and for which there is no established harvest and transport system. Biomass processors are unlikely to manage the supply chain, but one value chain option is that a large central processor will engage or form an agent to occupy a “middle-man” role. Farmers could similarly form a cooperative or other corporate structure to be the middle-man. A key part of managing the supply chain will be in product diversification. This is discussed in greater detail in Chapter 4. Diversification within the sugar industry has considered production of renewable energy from ethanol or electricity co-generation and other possible new enterprises, such as the production of fibre-based products (paper, packaging, etc.) or lactic acid and other chemical byproducts, livestock feed and fertilizers products. Product diversification for Mallee biomass is also likely, with products including electricity, eucalyptus oil, and the use of pyrolysis to produce liquid fuels (via bio-crude oil or Fischer Tropsh synthesis), biochar and chemicals. This diverse product base will also affect supply chain management. Sugarcane product diversification evolved from an established sugar market which was able to sustain development of new product streams. Development of an established biomass market will be required to support development of sustainable biomass supply chains. It is not clear whether this large scale market will be for electricity generation or the bio-oil market. Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya (2010) identify a supply chain as being a composition (or framework) of five important building blocks Figure 6.1. The value chain is concerned with systems properties describing value-adding, value loss and distribution of benefits throughout the chain. Second, a material handling chain, concerns the physical equipment and processes used to enable value adding. The third dimension, viz. a collaboration chain, focuses on the way stakeholders collaborate and comanage the material handling activity. Fourth, the collaboration chain is held together through an effective information chain that enables stakeholders to manage their system. Finally, only once these four chains are understood and well managed, could one consider integrated system innovations where all processes are aligned to enhance efficiency. Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya (2010) suggest that the interaction between the different above-mentioned chains is critical and any innovation that does not consider all these dimensions simultaneously will probably fail. 141
Figure 6.1 Building blocks of the supply chain (Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya (2010) Agricultural supply chains are often more complex compared to other commodities. Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya (2010) highlight the need to identify: • where along the supply chain improvements can be made, • which tools will be the most appropriate drivers of change, and • in what way should policies and management be altered to support possible opportunities. In the sugar industry the supply chain is complex containing trade-offs and unpredictable outcomes. The introduction of alternative products introduces more system complexity but adds resilience. Fragmentation and especially grower miller conflict is universally prevalent (Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya, 2010). In particular the cane payment system promotes risk shifting between parties and is often perceived as a disincentive towards innovation and system integration. Industry leadership and sufficient government support have been essential to drive improvements. The mallee supply chain will require similar trade-offs especially with multiple product streams. On the downstream side of the supply chain commodity-type products, such as sugar and biomass, demand lean supply chain principles. However, upstream, the supply chain can comprise of a multitude of autonomous producers with unsynchronized and individually focused decision-making incentives. In addition, as a result of climatic variability, upstream supplies often produce inconsistent volumes and qualities. The latter characteristics demand more agile supply chain principles and hence create potentially contradictory goals within the integrated chain. As a result, upstream production chains are often over capitalized (Bezuidenhout and Bodhanya, 2010). Under-utilisation is not necessarily a problem when a certain level of risk mitigation is incorporated into the system to create resilience. 142
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Sustainable Biomass Supply Chain fo
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Foreword This report provides an as
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include business development (new p
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Acknowledgments The authors would l
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4.1 Product Options and Supply Chai
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Table 4.2 Assessment of current val
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Figure 3.4 Tracked rigid self-prope
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Executive Summary What the report i
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• Biomass production potential of
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• As the Industry expands, the mo
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Harvesting, transport and storage s
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Biomass processing, supply chain pl
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Key barriers to biomass industries
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Crop-Biomass Production Production
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Figure 1.1 The cropping and pasture
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Table 1.1 Mallee species used for p
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1.1.4 Growth Cycle Mallee System Ma
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northern New South Wales (where it
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Almost 80% of the industry now cuts
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Bark has relatively high ash but as
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Carbon sinks Planting of mallees to
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Table 1.5(a) State Land area devote
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out the fluctuations in farm income
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Mallee system Most of the mallee bi
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inconclusive result may have been d
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For a sustainable woody crop indust
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changed significantly since they we
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Figure 2.2 Biosystems Engineering p
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Whole-of-crop harvesting represents
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During the last decade the harvesti
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single row, as this would improve t
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2.2.2.2 Weight Sugar System The Aus
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Table 2.1 Harvester Comparison Tabl
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The quality of cut may be less impo
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ate than a 170 tonne/ha crop of sta
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Dry Leaf 6.1 - 3.5 17.0 58.9 53.2 T
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Bulk density will be a key consider
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Table 2.4 EM levels in cane supply
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L/T L/T 60 0.97 0.71 80 0.92 0.66 1
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Total 7.5-26 16.5 Mallee System The
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• waiting for mill delivery of em
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perhaps at 10 - 20 km intervals. Th
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transport arrangements, harvest gro
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contractors and growers, and the fa
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experience of the sugar industry wi
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Table 2.11 Alternative harvest paym
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onto the harvester. BR+F still send
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Repairs and maintenance 2.10 Capita
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Figure 2.14 and Table 2.14 describe
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Sichter et al. (2005)), harvest and
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Transport efficiencies may be possi
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3. Transport and Storage Systems Tr
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same time, the potential problems o
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Figure 3.3 Articulated self-propell
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• The harvester will not have any
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Figure 3.7 Gross mass compared with
Page 113 and 114: external factors dramatically impac
Page 115 and 116: Figure 3.11 The effect of haulout t
Page 117 and 118: 3.3 Road Transport 3.3.1 Configurat
Page 119 and 120: Figure 3.15 shows an example of the
Page 121 and 122: Road distance one way < 20 km 70 km
Page 123 and 124: Haul distance is largely outside th
Page 125 and 126: 3.6 Recommendations The nature of t
Page 127 and 128: • The strategy offered lower tota
Page 129 and 130: sugarcane billets are such that wit
Page 131 and 132: • Transfer the whole tree product
Page 133 and 134: Figure 4.5(b) Energy balance of con
Page 135 and 136: 2010). Table 4.2 presents a summary
Page 137 and 138: 4.4.2 Activated charcoal Activated
Page 139 and 140: Nett Product Value ($/t) $475.00 $
Page 141 and 142: Table 4.9 presents an estimation of
Page 143 and 144: • Oil from leaf @ $2/kg • Synth
Page 145 and 146: • The mallee oil would be extract
Page 147 and 148: 5. Industry and Business Structures
Page 149 and 150: is conducted into tariff levels on
Page 151 and 152: Bx is % brix in first expressed jui
Page 153 and 154: Hildebrand (2002) estimated that th
Page 155 and 156: also has a flow on effect to the sp
Page 157 and 158: Sugar Industry Illustrative Example
Page 159 and 160: with super size multi-lift bins ove
Page 161 and 162: farmer vs. harvester) is the next l
Page 163: 6. Supply Chain Planning and Manage
Page 167 and 168: weighed against the costs of operat
Page 169 and 170: • There is close contact between
Page 171 and 172: 6.4 Planning, Management Tools and
Page 173 and 174: • Harvest and transport logistics
Page 175 and 176: interface. The system allows users
Page 177 and 178: Case Study 6.2 - Model Application
Page 179 and 180: Relationships between sectors and p
Page 181 and 182: 7. Supply Chain Modelling and Econo
Page 183 and 184: It was assumed that there was a fif
Page 185 and 186: Table 7.2 Scenario two capital equi
Page 187 and 188: Table 7.4 Fuel burn rates harvester
Page 189 and 190: Figure 7.5 Effect of capital equipm
Page 191 and 192: Figure 7.7 Effect of annual tonnes
Page 193 and 194: 30 1.8 7.0 12.3 17.5 50 1.1 4.3 7.6
Page 195 and 196: 8. Conclusions and Recommendations
Page 197 and 198: Biomass bulk density has a large im
Page 199 and 200: Vehicles used for infield haulout w
Page 201 and 202: This can be compared with harvest a
Page 203 and 204: While diversification can add value
Page 205 and 206: Appendix 1: Comparative Assessment
Page 207 and 208: and transport conditions. Billet le
Page 209 and 210: that cane production is the most pr
Page 211 and 212: on sugar only, other proceeds (mola
Page 213 and 214: References Agnew, J 2002. A Partici
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Enecon 2001. Integrated Tree Proces
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Keating, BA, Antony, G, Brennan, LE
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Ridge, DR and Linedale, AL, 1997. T
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Willcox, T, Hussey, B, Chapple, D a
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