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Feature Article

To paraphrase George Orwell, some biofuels are more equal than others. This seems to be one of the main conclusions of two recent UK reports on biofuels, which both warn that certain biofuels could end up exacerbating climate change rather than mitigating it. This is also one of the central findings in a recent study commissioned by the Swiss government, which showed that the overall environmental impact of some biofuels is greater than fossil fuels.

The reports by the Royal Society, the UK's main scientific academy, and the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) were investigating different aspects of biofuels, but both criticized the UK's new biofuel regulations. Known as the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO), these require that from April 2008 all petrol and diesel sold in the UK contain 2.5% biofuels, rising to 5% by 2010.

The Royal Society's report, entitled Sustainable biofuels: prospects and challenges, assessed the potential scientific developments that could contribute to the production of biofuels. It concluded that biofuels should not be regarded as a ‘silver bullets' for reducing the emission of greenhouse gases by the transport sector, especially as different biofuels vary greatly in their environmental impacts. It therefore argued that rather than set arbitrary targets for the amount of biofuels in petrol, the RTFO should instead set targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from fuel.

‘In designing policies and incentives to encourage investment in and the use of biofuels, it is important to remember that one biofuel is not the same as another,' explained Professor John Pickett from Rothamsted Research, Harpenden, who chaired the study. ‘The greenhouse gas savings of each depends on how crops are grown and converted and how the fuel is used. So, indiscriminately increasing the amount of biofuels we are using may not automatically lead to the best reductions in emissions.'

The EAC reached a similar conclusion in its report entitled Are biofuels sustainable?. This examined the role biofuels might play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving fuel security, as well as their potential economic and environmental impacts. It too found that different biofuels have varying levels of environmental impacts, but argued that most of the current generation of biofuels have some of the greatest impacts. It therefore recommended that the government should place a moratorium on encouraging the use of biofuels until the next generation of more environmentally-friendly biofuels become available.

‘Biofuels can reduce greenhouse gas emissions from road transport – but at present most biofuels have a detrimental impact on the environment overall,' said EAC chairman Tim Yeo.

The reactions to the Royal Society report were generally positive from all sides of the biofuel debate, with both the UK Renewable Energy Association (REA) and Friends of the Earth agreeing that there is no point encouraging the use of biofuels that do not deliver positive reductions in greenhouse gases. The reaction to the EAC report was much more critical, with the REA saying the report was ‘very disappointing given the amount of work done on environmental and social sustainability by the UK biofuel industry'. The European Commission, which reaffirmed its commitment to biofuels making up 10% of petrol by 2020 in its recently published proposal for a renewable energy directive, was also critical. The Commission's energy commissioner, Andris Piebalgs, announced that he strongly disagreed with the report's opinion on the negative environmental effects of current EU biofuel policy.

Both reports also highlighted that more research needs to be done into assessing the overall environmental impact of different biofuels over their entire lifecycle, from growing the plant feedstocks to processing them into fuel. One of the first studies to attempt this was recently conducted by researchers from Empa, a Swiss research institute, for the Swiss government, which only gives tax breaks to biofuels that have a lower environmental impact than fossil fuels.

The Empa study confirmed that the environmental impact of different biofuels varies widely, with nearly half of the 26 biofuels in the study having greater environmental impacts than fossil fuels. The current biofuel front-runners, such as US corn ethanol and Brazilian soybean biodiesel, came out worst, while the biofuels that came out best were those based on waste material, such as recycled cooking oil.

Related Links

The Empa study is available at www.bioenergywiki.net/images/8/80/Empa_Bioenergie_ExecSumm_engl.pdf, while a review of the study was recently published in Science.

The views represented here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of John Wiley and Sons, Ltd. or of the SCI.

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