| Article ID: | iaor2005560 |
| Country: | United States |
| Volume: | 76 |
| Issue: | 1 |
| Start Page Number: | 39 |
| End Page Number: | 59 |
| Publication Date: | Apr 2003 |
| Journal: | Agricultural Systems |
| Authors: | Audsley E., Annetts J.E. |
A rural biorefinery is the concept of an integrated factory to process crops into “refined” fractions, located at the centre of a farming community. The biorefinery system starts with the contract harvesting of whole crops (grain and straw) which are then stored with fractionated (including drying as necessary) into products and by-product for sale. This paper describes the models which analyse the processes and the profitability or otherwise of possible biorefinery systems in Europe. In particular, this paper details the linear programming (LP) model used to optimise the profitability and determine the optimal planning of processes in a biorefinery factory, details of the complexities of defining how processes affect products and by-products and how this is used within the linear program. An example LP matrix and solution is used to illustrate the formulation and for understanding. The work is the culmination of 3 years EU and MAFF funded projects to assess the potential of such centralised and integrated systems of crop processing as alternatives to more conventional separate harvesting and milling processes.