How much biomass exists right now?
Worldwide, total “standing crop” biomass (99% on land, and 80% in trees) is a huge resource, equivalent to about 60 years of world energy use in the year 2000 (1250 billion metric tonnes of dry plant matter, containing 560 billion tonnes of carbon). For the U.S. alone, standing vegetation has been variously estimated at between 65 and 90 billion tonnes of dry matter (30-40 billion tonnes of carbon), equivalent to 14-19 years of current U.S. primary energy use. However, the Earth actually grows every year about 130 billion tonnes of biomass on land (60 billion tonnes of carbon) and a further 100 billion tonnes in the rivers, lakes and oceans (46 billion tonnes carbon). The energy content of this annual biomass production is estimated to be more than 6 times world energy use or 2,640 exajoules (2500 Quads) on land, with an additional 2024 exajoules (1920 Quads) in the waters.
