European Parliament confirms law to limit crop-based biofuels
Wed 29 April 2015
View all news
The European Parliament has given its final approval to a law limiting to 7% the use of crop-based biofuel in the transport sector. The European Commission said, in tabling the final proposal, that it's clear that biofuels can contribute to reducing GHG emissions from transport but that some can do more harm than good to the environment.
According to EurActiv, the official endorsement came after more than seven years of political bickering and lengthy negotiations between MEPs and EU member states on the controversial law.
The new law will limit to 7% the use of harmful biofuels which compete with crops grown on agricultural land, while allowing member states to set lower national limits.
Pietro Caloprisco of Brussels-based pressure group T&E said (reported by EurActiv): "With this limit, Europe will prevent emissions of up to 320 million tonnes of CO2, which would otherwise have been caused by extra bad biofuels needed to meet the 10% target. The emissions avoided equal to Poland’s total carbon emissions in 2012.
“Maybe this is not the end of bad biofuels now. But this surely is the beginning of the end for pouring food in our tanks. The message is clear: land-based biofuels have no future in Europe, at least after 2020,”
The final version of the text also sets an indicative 0.5% target for so-called second generation biofuels, whose contribution would count double towards the 10% renewable energy target for transport.
Raffaello Garofalo, the Secretary General of European Biodiesel Board, said the industry welcomed the newly adopted legislation, and it will continue to "improve the sustainability biodiesel, in order to fully contribute to the decarbonisation of fuels in the EU in the next decade".
Leaders of Sustainable Biofuels (LSB), said the compromise that was endorsed by the European Parliament lacks concrete and harmonized measures. LSB chair Marko Janhunen said (reported by Edie): "Our industry has been calling for regulatory certainty for years. What has been agreed now is a first step but uncertainty continues. An opportunity to kick start the roll out of advanced biofuels in the EU has been missed."
Fuel suppliers and the European Commission will regularly report on emissions deriving from indirect land use change (ILUC). But lawmakers failed to have these emissions included in the carbon accounting, a method used for calculating greenhouse gas emissions and identify the most polluting biofuels.
The LowCVP and DfT joint transport energy task force recently published their recommendations for work needed on future fuels trajectory. Andy Eastlake the Managing director of the LowCVP said ”Agreeing a compromise on Biofuels as soon as possible was critical to unlocking progress for renewable energy in transport and enabling the stakeholders to look forwards to developing the requirements for long term sustainability in the transport energy sector”
Related Links
< Back to news list