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Biofuels: 'Irrational' and 'worse than nonrenewable fuel sources'

The UK's "irrational" usage of biofuels will cost vehicle drivers around ₤ 460 million over the next 12 months, a think tank states.

A report by Chatham House, external states the growing dependence on sustainable liquid fuels will also increase food rates.

The author says that biodiesel made from grease was even worse for the environment than nonrenewable fuel sources.

Under EU law, external, biofuels are set to make up 5% of the UK's transportation fuel from today.

Since 2008, the UK has needed fuel providers to include a growing percentage of sustainable products into the petrol and diesel they provide. These biofuels are generally ethanol distilled from corn and biodiesel made from rapeseed, utilized cooking oil and tallow.

Deep fried fuel

But research performed for Chatham House states that reaching the 5% level means that UK motorists will need to pay an additional ₤ 460m a year because of the greater cost of fuel at the pump and from filling more often as biofuels have a lower energy material.

The report say that if the UK is to satisfy its commitments to EU energy targets the cost to motorists is likely to rise to ₤ 1.3 bn per year by 2020.

"It is tough to discover any excellent news," Rob Bailey, senior research study fellow at Chatham House, informed BBC News.

"Biofuels increase costs and they are a really expensive method to decrease carbon emissions," he stated.

The EU biofuel mandates are likewise having extremely distorting results in the market. Because utilized cooking oil is considered among the most sustainable kinds of biodiesel, the rate for it has increased quickly. Rob Bailey states that towards the end of 2012 it was more pricey than refined palm oil.

"It produces a financial reward to purchase refined palm oil, prepare a chip in it to turn it into utilized cooking oil and after that offer it at revenue,"

"It is insane however the rewards exist."

There are also stresses that taking EU land out of production to grow rapeseed oil in specific is developing more climate issues than it resolves. The more fuel of this type that is put into vehicles the larger the deficit produced in the edible oils market. This had caused increased imports of palm oil from Indonesia, typically produced on deforested land.

"Once you consider these indirect results, biofuels made from vegetable oils really result worldwide in more emissions than you would get from utilizing diesel in the first place," stated Rob Bailey.

"Plus you are asking vehicle drivers to pay more for the fuel - it makes no sense, it is a totally irrational technique."

Biofuel benefits

The European Biodiesel Board (EBB), which represents the market, external across the EU, said it knew the problems brought on by the mandate. But it believes that biofuels have many positives.

"Blaming biofuels for all the troubles in the world is a bit too exaggerated," stated Isabelle Maurizi, task manager at the EBB.

"It has actually brought great deals of benefits. It has actually improved the security of our diesel; it has actually decreased EU reliance on animal feed imports, thanks to the rapeseed we grow for biodiesel."

"If there was no biodiesel farmers would just make their land idle - no food, no feed!"

As the UK strikes the 5% of liquid fuels mark, the government faces some challenging decisions on how to progress on this problem as it faces tripling the expenses for motorists by 2020.

Insiders suggest its choice would be to try and get agreement in Brussels on the impacts of indirect costs which may constrain what counts as biofuel. However getting from nations with effective farming sectors who benefit from the current plan will be tough.

"When you have a lobby that includes the agricultural sector and the oil sector it is really tough for Governments to make a U-turn," stated Rob Bailey.

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