1 Climate Change: Growing Doubts Over Chip Fat Biofuel
sebastianfogar edited this page 2025-01-11 13:49:33 +01:00


Climate change: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

comments

354 Comments

New research questions the environmental impact of rising imports of used cooking oil (UCO) into the UK and Europe.

Chip fat and other oils are thought about waste, so when they are utilized to make biodiesel it conserves carbon emissions by displacing fossil oil.

But such is the need throughout Europe that imports now represent majority of the UCO that's made into fuel.

According to the study, external, there's no way to show these imports are sustainable.

With no screening of what's coming in, professionals believe it is likewise ripe for scams.

Used cooking oil imports might boost logging

Consumers pose 'growing danger' to tropical forests

Reducing emissions from transport is showing to be among the most difficult difficulties for governments all over the world.

They have actually motivated the usage of biofuels as a crucial means of suppressing carbon from automobiles and lorries.

Biofuels are usually a blend of nonrenewable fuel source and oil made from plants or vegetables.

The reality that these crops can be re-grown and take in more CO2 implies they counteract the carbon given off when used in engines.

Soy and palm oil were as soon as widely utilized as parts of biodiesel however this practice has actually been extensively rejected due to the fact that it encourages logging.

So for the last decade approximately, the usage of utilized cooking oil has actually expanded massively as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have actually become a key component of biodiesel with an effective industry emerging across Europe to gather and process the item.

But with the amount of biodiesel made from by around 40% every year because 2014, there merely isn't enough chip fat to walk around.

According to a report from the campaign group Transport & Environment, external, more than half of the UCO used in Europe is imported.

Their study recommends this is extremely problematic when it concerns influence on the environment.

While UCO is thought about a waste material in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has actually long been used to feed animals. The report raises the concern of what people in these countries are changing the UCO with, when it is exported.

In 2019, Malaysia exported 90 million litres of UCO to the UK and Ireland. Figures for their exports to other European countries aren't available but the flow of UCO is likely to be comparable.

With a population of around 33 million, that's close to three litres per head of used oil that's gathered and exported to the UK and Ireland alone.

By comparison, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million individuals, handled to collect around five million litres of UCO in 2019.

"Because we are buying it, they have less used cooking oil to utilize on the important things that they were previously utilizing it for," said Greg Archer with Transport & Environment.

"And they're simply purchasing more virgin oil and that virgin oil is mainly palm oil, since that's the cheapest oil available.

"So indirectly, we're just motivating more logging in Southeast Asia."

Another major issue with UCO is the suspicion of fraud.

Because of need from Europe, the price of UCO is frequently higher than palm oil. The concern is that some deceitful traders are simply diluting shipments of UCO with palm.

As oils of various types are mixed in bulk for transportation, and no testing of the products is carried out, some experts believe scams is swarming.

The recommendation of scams anywhere along the chain of supply is rejected by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who state there are robust accreditation plans in place.

"It is extensively understood that the European Commission has actually taken relevant steps to totally curb unsound market practices in biofuel markets," stated Angel Alberdi, EWABA's secretary general.

He states a brand-new database being established by the EU will guarantee that trading, certification and sustainability information on all bio-liquids will need to be registered.

"The combination of revised accreditation plans and the pan-EU track and trace database will make sure that no sustainability issues occur in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he told BBC News.

Others in the field are worried that the database idea, which was very first mooted in 2018, might not be effective in stemming believed fraud.

The report from Transport & Environment mentions that with shipping and air travel wanting to decarbonise by utilizing biofuels, need for UCO could double over the next years.

"Rising the demand beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and risks of using 'fake' UCO, possibly causing indirect effects such as logging."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

Related topics

COP26

Paris environment arrangement

Climate