Last week I attended 'Fuelling the Debate: The Ethics of Biofuels' at the Dana Centre. While the debate was informative and some of the new R+D being undertaken on new crops was interesting I was still slightly dampened by the pro-biofuels dominated audience. Kenneth Richter from Friends of the Earth who is campaigning against Biofuels was outnumbered by the 3 other speakers who were flying the biofuels flag. At the present time in the UK there is a target to get 10% of transport energy from renewable sources as we continue to approach uncertain fossil fuel stocks and rocketing fuel prices. The majority of this increase in renewable energy is expected to be comprised of mainly crop-based biofuels.
It was made clear in the talk that Biofuels - which at the moment mean either bioethanol (sugarcane, corn or wheat derived) or biodiesel (palm, soy bean, oilseed rape derived) - cannot in any way replace fossil fuels. This is mainly because of the difference in energy density between fossil fuels and plant based fuels. In addition to this there is no way that a large amount of crops can be raised sustainably to meet the demands. This was outlined by the ratio of 3:5 when comparing the amount of fuel used in ONE day compared to the amount of bio-fuel produced in one year.
In the Q+A session I raised the point that biofuels as they currently stand are falsly marketed as a sustainable fuel because the agricultural methods used to cultivate them are dependent on fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides which are derived from fossil fuels. In my opinion that makes the biofuels ethics and sustainability question null and void. Yes, we can grow vast amounts of crops for fuel, but only until the oil runs out!
Christine Raines, a plant biologist from the University of Essex had some interesting points about the developments of new biofuels. One of these is the use of lignocellulosic biofuels which are more effective because you can use all of the plant biomass instead of just the edible (sugary, starchy or oily) part. This goes someway to provide an answer to the food vs fuel argument as it means the edible part of the crop can be retained as a food source and the inedible part of the crop can be processed to make fuel. Another option is the production of algal biofuel. One benefit of algae is that it can be grown where other crops cannot be cultivated. However at the present time this idea is still at its infantile experimental stage and if the UK were to meet its 10% target it would need an algae pond 2 times the size of Greater London!
Nigel Mortimer, Managing Director from North Energy Associates Ltd, laid out some good ethical principles as part of a guide for policy development. Part of this focused on the need for fair trade principles including labour rights and intellectual property rights. However, these projected guidelines do nothing to settle my concerns of how we will once again be reliant on importing a high percentage of our energy requirements from overseas. This results in more knock on effects and does little to provide us with energy security whilst potentially leading to even more exploitative tactics in poorer countries where there is ample land and conditions to grow large amounts of crops.
For these reasons alone I do not see how biofuels can contribute to a sustainable energy solution when they themselves require energy intensive inputs and large areas of land. Even with my optimistic eyes all I can envisage is more deforestation, more biodiversity threatened and more vulnerable farmers being taken advantage of because they have no other way to feed their families.
You can see the report Biofuels: ethical issues carried out by the Nuffield Council of Bioethics here.
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