Concerns about climate change related to fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions require the development of alternative energy resources. In most scenario studies on future energy supply, bio-energy is one of the dominant renewable alternatives foreseen. Apart from the use of residues and wastes, the cultivation of dedicated ‘energy crops’ will be necessary. Especially in densely populated regions such as the Netherlands, energy crop introduction is strongly hampered by lack of available land, related to the low valued added of energy crops compared to e.g. agriculture. A strategy that may help overcome these problems is multiple land use: combining the production of energy crops to other targets on the same tract of land. If a plot not only generates biomass, but also serves other functions such as nature management, more income may be generated, and overall land use efficiency may increase. Central question in this thesis is whether, and to what extent, multiple land use can improve opportunities for energy crops in the Netherlands, in comparison with energy cropping as single land use. We specified this question into three criteria: (1) multiple land use energy farming options should be biophysically feasible; (2) such combinations should lead to lower biomass production prices compared to single land use; (3) the combinations should open up an area for energy cropping significant to the national renewable energy targets. The first research topic was to further identify and specify the concept of multiple land use, and develop an operationalisation procedure. Subsequently, specific options for combination of energy crop cultivation with another function were elaborated. In a relatively simple and qualitative way, we analysed four options with willow as an energy crop: combination with drinking water production (on two levels), with traditional willow coppice management, and with an ecological corridor function. We executed more detailed studies on two combination options: willow in hydrological buffer zones ...