EU fails to reach decision on how to measure climate impact of biofuels

Senior EU officials have failed to agree on how to measure the full climate impact of biofuels, prolonging uncertainty in a debate that threatens to wipe out large parts of Europe’s biodiesel industry.

The talks followed warnings from scientists that using biodiesel made from European rapeseed, imported palm oil and soybeans does nothing to prevent climate change and could actually accelerate it.

After more than a year of in-fighting within the European Commission, the bloc’s 27 commissioners had been expected to choose between three main policy options at the meeting, but they failed to endorse any of them.

Discussions will now continue in an attempt to reach agreement on a proposal before the end of the year, EU sources said.

“The good news is that there appears to be a consensus in the commission that the indirect impacts of biofuels need to be taken seriously,” said Nusa Urbancic, a clean fuels campaigner for green transport lobby T&E. “The bad news is, after several years, we are still waiting for a legal proposal to get out of the starting gate.”

The debate centred on a relatively new concept known as indirect land use change (ILUC). ILUC is a theory that states that by diverting food-crops into fuel tanks, biofuel production increases overall global demand for agricultural land.

If farmers meet that extra demand by cutting down rainforest and draining peatland, it results in the release of millions of tons of additional carbon emissions.

Studies carried out for the commission showed that the risk of ILUC is far greater for biodiesel — a diesel substitute typically made from oilseeds — than it is for bioethanol — a gasoline-substitute usually made from grain or sugar.

By estimating the ILUC emissions associated with each specific crop, scientists concluded most biodiesel currently used in Europe emits more carbon than conventional diesel.

“It was a positive and good debate,” said EU climate spokesman Isaac Valero Ladron. “There is a strong consensus on the need to act and address ILUC.”

EU sources said the commission’s climate and energy department would continue to lead efforts to find a compromise but that the agriculture, trade and industry departments would be more closely involved in the talks than before.

That will be seen by some as a sign that tough EU proposals on ILUC are less likely, given the agriculture and trade departments are known to oppose any measure that would exclude European or imported biodiesel from the EU mandates.

The EU adopted two laws in 2009 to spur biofuel use. The renewable energy directive requires countries to achieve a 10% share of green energy in road transport by 2020, the vast majority of which will be met using biofuels.

The real market driver, however, was the related directive on fuel quality, which forces oil companies to cut the carbon content of transport fuels by 6% by 2020.

Europe’s rising demand for diesel means biodiesel is projected to account for two-thirds of EU biofuel use in 2020. If such fuels are excluded from the EU’s targets, increased bioethanol production and imports are unlikely to make up the shortfall.

The realisation that EU rules on ILUC could kill off much of Europe’s estimated €13bn biodiesel industry and undermine its climate goals led to paralysis within the commission, while officials argued over whether current ILUC models were robust enough to warrant such drastic action.

Biodiesel producers say there is too much uncertainty in the assumptions used to model ILUC emissions to justify immediate action, and that specific rules should be delayed for several years in favour of an indirect approach.

— Reuters