Conference Presentation | Conference presentations and posters | Potentiale, Bioenergiesysteme, Logistik
The Green Parking Area – Utilization of urban parking areas for cultivation of algae
Zellinger M, Riepl R, Lichtenegger K, Meixner K, Drosg B, Enigl M, Theuretzbacher F, Schipfer F.
Published 2018
Citation: Zellinger M, Riepl R, Lichtenegger K, Meixner K, Drosg B, Enigl M, Theuretzbacher F, Schipfer F. The Green Parking Area – Utilization of urban parking areas for cultivation of algae. presentation at the WSED, Wels, Austria, 01. March 2018.
Abstract
The present study examines the possible use of urban and rural traffic areas for producing biomass. Many of those areas (for example, parking lots at cinemas and shopping centers) are only intensively used during certain times. Most of the time those areas remain empty.
At the same time a major problem for large-scale implementation of renewable energy is the massive land use resulting from limited energy density of solar radiation and, in case of biomass production, low efficiency for utilization of solar radiation by plants. Additionally, renewable energies are often criticized for the fact that they require areas, which could also be used for food and feed production.
Therefore, it is an attractive idea to use some of the traffic areas that are lost for the ecosystem anyway for biomass production. This approach is novel that no data have been available yet. The aim of this work was therefore to develop technical solutions, to quantify the technical potential for this type of biomass production and, subsequently, for energy supply, based on data on the area utilization, climatic data and known properties of microalgae.
The work deals with the question of the technical potential for this approach in Austria. This question is
answered by a survey of the area data in Austria, the elaboration of technical systems for a possible implementation, as well as by calculating the biomass potential, based on simulation results. The data have been collected, analyzed and evaluated in a comprehensive literature search. The potential analysis provides an overview of the distribution of traffic areas in Austria and the resulting biomass potential. Thus, a list of possible areas including biomass and energy quantities is available.