(lack of) Food for Thought

Recently, the EU has capped the first generation biofuel requirement from 10% of transportation fuel by 2020 to 6%, in light of concerns surrounding land use change and related price increases. First generation biofuels are those produced from rapeseed, palm oil, soya and other food crops (Bellona Europe) but there are moves now to transfer from these forms of biofuel to second generation fuels such as agricultural waste and algae (Besant, 2013).

Biofuels are divided into bioethanol and biodiesel, and the use of biodiesel does not require any alteration to a diesel engine (Muir, 2013), which is one of the advantages of using biofuels, which has lead to the increasing prominence of biofuels in transport (Mattison and Norris, 2007). They were also claimed to be carbon neutral as the crops ‘extract’ CO₂ for respiration and therefore this negated the CO₂ released when burnt for fuel, and that the use of biofuels slightly reduced dependence on conventional sources. However this has been progressively criticized as being too simplistic. Therefore after the Gallagher Review (independent EU report) which concluded that biofuels could actually increase GHG emissions due to land use change, the EU came under increasing pressure to alter the EU Biofuels Directive. This came into fruition in September when the requirement for biofuel use in transportation fuel was reduced to 6%.

(source: quarterbridge.wordpress.com,2013)

Other criticisms of biofuels concern the effect on food security, as Oxfam claims that the land which is currently being used for biofuels could be used to feed 127 million people. This seems incredibly high, although whether this land would realistically produce high yield crops for food, is still under debate. The land used for growing biofuels would be ideally located on land unsuitable for agriculture (Kanellos, 2008), however this seems unrealistic in countries less able to irrigate sufficiently, or in areas unable to access to fertilizers, as otherwise the area would have been likely been used for agriculture already. This is linked to the viability of growing biofuels, dependent on the area’s characteristics such as climate, water availability, if the crop is native to the area and fertilizer availability/affordability, and existing land use.

Biodiversity must also be considered, as the large areas of land given over to biofuels would only consist of one crop, and in turn this can lead to insects and pests becoming more effective at destroying that one type of crop, leading to ecological system degradation. Growing biofuels generally causes a change in species populations, leading to a changing community structure and the disappearance and colonisation of different species (JNCC report no. 456, 2011). Biodiversity change goes hand in hand with land use change.

Indirect land use change occurs when land which would otherwise have been used for agriculture is used for biofuel cultivation for instance (Earnst and Young, 2013), and therefore agriculture is pushed on to more marginal lands such as peat bogs which could release even more CO₂, require more intensive farming or have a reduced food output. These problems can be avoided through changing the type of fuel used for biofuels, for instance moving towards cultivating and using algae which is higher yielding and more space efficient (Biofuel.org).

Large scale algae cultivation (source: alibaba.com, 2013)

 

I think biofuels have their place in the future of the global energy mix, however despite the reduction in GHGs produced when combusted due to the cleaner burning fuel, I contest the idea of biofuels being ‘renewable’. Although they can be continuously grown on demand, they are not naturally occurring in the same way that heat or wind is, and to me, the negative direct and indirect effects outweigh the benefits, as there are other alternatives to reduce reliance on petrol or diesel for transport fuel. I support the capped limit on biofuels place in EU transportation fuel, however I feel this should have a caveat of finding an alternative to first generation biofuels, or a promise of investment in R&D for the use of algae for instance. Otherwise there is a danger of momentum being moved in the opposite direction to encouraging a shift to renewables and continuing to undo the positive policies applied under the Renewables Directive.