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| Bright Future for Biofuels, says report
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| Posted by: Community Fuels |
6/12/2006 |
People & the Planet - London,UK. Biofuels can significantly reduce global dependence on oil, according to a new Worldwatch Institute report. This says that athough oil still accounts for more than 96 per cent of transport fuel use, biofuel production has doubled since 2001 and is poised for even stronger growth as the industry responds to higher fuel prices and supportive government policies.
Monday, June 12, 2006
Bright Future for Biofuels, says report |
People & the Planet - London,UK. Biofuels can significantly reduce global dependence on oil, according to a new Worldwatch Institute report. This says that athough oil still accounts for more than 96 per cent of transport fuel use, biofuel production has doubled since 2001 and is poised for even stronger growth as the industry responds to higher fuel prices and supportive government policies.
Last year, world biofuel production surpassed 670,000 barrels per day, the equivalent of about 1 per cent of the global transport fuel market. "Coordinated action to expand biofuel markets and advance new technologies could relieve pressure on oil prices while strengthening agricultural economies and reducing climate-altering emissions," says Worldwatch Institute President Christopher Flavin.
The new report, sponsored by the German Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV), is a comprehensive assessment of the opportunities and risks associated with the large-scale international development of biofuels. It includes information from existing country studies on biofuel use in Brazil, China, Germany, India, and Tanzania.
Brazil is the world's biofuel leader, with half of its sugar cane crop providing more than 40 per cent of its non-diesel transport fuel. In the United States, where 15 per cent of the corn crop provides about 2 per cent of the non-diesel transport fuel, ethanol production is growing even more rapidly.
The report says that this surging growth may allow the United States to overtake Brazil as the world's biofuel leader this year. Both countries are now estimated to be producing ethanol at less than the current cost of gasoline.
Figures cited in the report reveal that biofuels could provide 37 per cent of US transport fuel within the next 25 years, and up to 75 per cent if automobile fuel economy doubles. Biofuels could replace 20-30 per cent of the oil used in European Union countries during the same time frame.
Ecological risks
As the first-ever global assessment of the potential social and environmental impacts of biofuels, Biofuels for Transportation warns that the large-scale use of biofuels carries significant agricultural and ecological risks.
"It is essential that government incentives be used to minimize competition between food and fuel crops and to discourage expansion onto ecologically valuable lands," says Worldwatch Biofuels Project Manager Suzanne Hunt. However, the report also finds that biofuels have the potential to increase energy security, create new economic opportunities in rural areas, and reduce local pollution and emissions of greenhouse gases.
The long-term potential of biofuels is in the use of non-food feedstock that include agricultural, municipal, and forestry wastes as well as fast-growing, cellulose-rich energy crops such as switchgrass. It is expected that the combination of cellulosic biomass resources and "next-generation" biofuel conversion technologies - including ethanol production using enzymes, or synthetic diesel production via gasification/Fischer-Tropsch synthesis - will compete with conventional gasoline and diesel fuel without subsidies in the medium term.
The report recommends policies to accelerate the development of biofuels, while maximizing the benefits and minimizing the risks.
For the complete article please link to: http://www.peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=2773 | |
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