Biofuels: 'Irrational' and 'Worse than Nonrenewable Fuel Source'
Biofuels: 'Irrational' and 'even worse than nonrenewable fuel sources'
The UK's "illogical" usage of biofuels will cost motorists around ₤ 460 million over the next 12 months, a think tank states.
A report by Chatham House, external says the growing dependence on sustainable liquid fuels will likewise increase food costs.
The author says that biodiesel made from grease was worse for the environment than nonrenewable fuel sources.
Under EU law, external, biofuels are set to comprise 5% of the UK's transportation fuel from today.
Since 2008, the UK has needed fuel suppliers to include a growing percentage of sustainable products into the gas and diesel they provide. These biofuels are primarily ethanol distilled from corn and biodiesel made from rapeseed, used cooking oil and tallow.
Deep fried fuel
But research carried out for Chatham House says that reaching the 5% level suggests that UK drivers will have to pay an additional ₤ 460m a year since of the greater expense of fuel at the pump and from filling up regularly as biofuels have a lower energy content.
The report say that if the UK is to meet its obligations to EU energy targets the expense to vehicle drivers is most likely to rise to ₤ 1.3 bn per annum by 2020.
"It is tough to discover any excellent news," Rob Bailey, senior research fellow at Chatham House, informed BBC News.
"Biofuels increase expenses and they are a really costly method to decrease carbon emissions," he said.
The EU biofuel mandates are likewise having hugely distorting effects in the market. Because used cooking oil is considered as one of the most sustainable kinds of biodiesel, the price for it has increased rapidly. Rob Bailey says that towards completion of 2012 it was more expensive than refined palm oil.
"It creates a monetary incentive to purchase refined palm oil, prepare a chip in it to turn it into used cooking oil and after that sell it at earnings,"
"It is crazy but the incentives are there."
There are also stresses that taking EU land out of production to grow rapeseed oil in particular is producing more climate issues than it resolves. The more fuel of this type that is put into cars the bigger the deficit developed in the edible oils market. This had actually caused increased imports of palm oil from Indonesia, frequently produced on deforested land.
"Once you consider these indirect effects, biofuels made from veggie oils in fact result worldwide in more emissions than you would receive from utilizing diesel in the first location," said Rob Bailey.
"Plus you are asking vehicle drivers to pay more for the fuel - it makes no sense, it is an entirely illogical technique."
Biofuel benefits
The European Biodiesel Board (EBB), which represents the market, external throughout the EU, stated it was aware of the problems triggered by the mandate. But it believes that biofuels have lots of positives.
"Blaming biofuels for all the troubles worldwide is a bit too exaggerated," said Isabelle Maurizi, job manager at the EBB.
"It has brought great deals of benefits. It has actually improved the security of our diesel; it has minimized EU dependency on animal feed imports, thanks to the rapeseed we grow for biodiesel."
"If there was no biodiesel farmers would simply make their land idle - no food, no feed!"
As the UK hits the 5% of liquid fuels mark, the federal government deals with some hard choices on how to move forward on this issue as it faces tripling the expenses for motorists by 2020.
Insiders suggest its choice would be to attempt and get arrangement in Brussels on the effects of indirect expenses which may constrain what counts as biofuel. However getting agreement from nations with effective farming sectors who gain from the existing arrangement will be difficult.
"When you have a lobby which consists of the agricultural sector and the oil sector it is really tough for Governments to make a U-turn," said Rob Bailey.
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