Report for French Government finds biofuels offer environment benefits but faces criticism on land-use effects
Tue 27 April 2010
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The French energy agency, ADEME, has published a report on the life-cycle impacts of first generation biofuels which concludes that environmental benefits should be obtainable. The report has been criticised, however, for being insufficiently focused on indirect land-use change impacts. A separate report compiled for the European Commission by the International Food policy Research Institute (IFPRI) concludes that indirect land-use change has an important effect on environmental sustainability but that current EU targets are small enough to safeguard the environmental impacts.
ADEME's final report was a reworking of a study first published last October. The initial report provided a positive assessment but it did not take into account direct and indirect land-use change impacts, prompting strong criticism from environmental groups in France and forcing the Government to demand further analysis.
The final report still puts emphasis on biofuels' environmental benefits without looking at land-use change but tempers its conclusions in a chapter on the issue.
The report shows that, when ignoring possible land-use change impacts, emission and energy savings could be 90 and 80% respectively for biofuels from waste oils and animal fat, compared to fossil fuels. For fuel additive ETBE from wheat, maize and beetroot, savings are below 50 and 25% respectively.
It finds energy and emission savings of 49-85% and 47-77% respectively for ethanol from wheat, beetroot and sugar cane, ETBE from sugar cane as well as biodiesel from rapeseed oil, sunflower, palm oil and soy beans.
The most pessimistic scenario concerning direct land-use change shows that emissions are significant and biofuels lose their advantage. For palm oil and sugar cane, other pessimistic scenarios find some benefits but these are significantly reduced. in terms of indirect land-use change , the most pessimistic scenario outlined in the final report (tropical forests cleared for biofuel production) shows that environmental benefits found without taking into account these impacts could be entirely cancelled out.
The report, compiled for the Commission by the International Food Policy Institute (IFPRI) used a global computable general equilibrium model (CGE) to estimate the impact of EU biofuels policies. According to the researchers, another major innovation is the introduction of a land-use module which allows for substitutability between land classes, classified according to agro-ecological zones (AEZs), and land extension possibilities.
The central policy scenario translates the 5.6% first-generation biofuels mix in road transport fuels in 2020 into an increase in biofuels consumption in the EU to 17.8 Mtoe. The required increase in biodiesel production is mostly domestic in the EU while the increase in bioethanol production is mostly concentrated in Brazil. It implies a considerable increase in EU imports of bioethanol.
World cropland increases by 0.07%, showing that there is indeed indirect land use change associated with the EU biofuels mandate. Direct emission savings from biofuels are estimated at 18 Mt CO2, additional emissions from ILUC at 5.3 Mt CO2 (mostly in Brazil), resulting in
a global net balance of nearly 13 Mt CO2 savings in a 20 years horizon.
The model simulations show that the effect of EU biofuels policies on food prices will remain very limited, with a maximum price change on the food bundle of +0.5% in Brazil and +0.14% in Europe.
Analysis of indirect land-use change effects by crop indicates that ethanol, and particularly sugar-based ethanol, will generate the highest potential gains in terms of net emission savings. For biodiesel, palm oil remains as efficient as rapeseed oil, even if peatland emissions are taken into account.
Simulations for EU biofuels consumption above 5.6% of road transport fuels show that indirect land-use change emissions can rapidly increase and erode the environmental sustainability of biofuels.
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