Page 38 - Advances in bioenergy the sustainability challenge

role in shaping policy options. For example, “food first” and other scenario evaluation
approaches exemplify this thinking. Several chapters in this book contribute to this
understanding, indicating that research has come a long way recently in helping us to
understand the bioenergy opportunity in a precautionary manner.

It is also important that policymakers consider the bioenergy opportunity in an integrated
manner as part of a multiprong strategy. There have never been “perfect” or “silver bullet”
solutions in the energy field and we must be careful not to examine bioenergy in a rarefied light
which would undermine its consideration altogether simply because we want an outcome free
of any risk. Precaution should lead us to minimize the magnitude of adverse impacts while also
balancing the need for social change sufficient to meet our pressing challenges of energy
security and climate change. Precaution, balance and integrated thinking are cross themes of
this book and serve as guideposts for its contribution to discussions of policy design and

implementation.

This book offers an authoritative overview of opportunities and challenges associated with
bioenergy utilization. In addition to up-to-date and detailed information on key issues for
biomass supply and conversion to energy, the book discusses conditions for the mobilization of
sustainable bioenergy supply chains and outlines governance systems to support this
mobilization.

The idea for this book came from the Publisher when John Wiley & Sons established a new
journal, the Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Energy and Environment, which publishes
review-type articles by authoritative authors. This book is based on selected articles from this
journal. The initial vision and effort of Tony Carwardine from Wiley was decisive for starting
this book project. He is now retired, but he provided helpful inputs into the shaping of the
book.

The Editors would also like to thank Peter Creaton, Dan Finch, Ella Mitchell, Peter Mitchell,
Faith Pidduck, Kerry Powell, and Prachi Sinha Sahay from Wiley for their valuable help
during the different phases of the book process.

Peter D. Lund
John Byrne
Göran Berndes
Iacovos A. Vasalos