Biofuels

I wrote last week about rising food prices and their impact on poorer households. In that post I criticised biofuels as creating more problems than they solve.

I'll talk a bit more about why biofuels aren't a green solution in a minute, but also last week - entirely coincidentally - the House of Commons Environment Select Committee came out in favour of axing EU biofuels targets; if for slightly different reasons.

Their concern is not only that the target can't be met, but also about land use - because utilising land for biofuel production is one of the main causes of deforestation (which I discussed here during the Bali Climate Change Summit last year); especially in rain-forest countries like Brazil.

The Environment Committee is also looking at how green bio-fuels really are. Whenever someone supporting nuclear power makes the point that nuclear emits no carbon dioxide the anti-nuclear lobby rushes counters that a substantial amount of carbon is emitted in the construction of nuclear power plants.

Fair point. But the same is true of biofuel - and unlike nuclear, it's an ongoing cost: because the energy output is in the actual production of the fuel as well as the construction of the processing plants. Almost as much fuel is used to create biofuel than is created.

How is that sustainable? And the only reason it is vaguely affordable is the vast, market-warping subsidies bunged to the bio-fuel industry. Without them, biofuel would be uneconomic, fields that have been dedicated to producing crops for fuel would be returned to use for food production and cereals and bread would begin falling in price again.

We need to remember the distinction between power and fuel, because power can run computers, light streets, boil kettles and cook meals, but it can't drive cars or operate central heating. For that we need liquid or gas fuels. One day, we may have nuclear-cell driven cars; we already have natural gas and hydrogen-fueled vehicles as well as those powered by batteries charged with green electricity, but bio-fuels aren't the solution - apologies to anyone who's just bought a Prius or other hybrid powered car!

Here's how the BBC reported the MPs' report calling for a scrapping of EU biofuels targets.