Prioritise greenest biofuels - Mandelson

05 July 2007 02:20  [Source: ICIS news]

PARIS (ICIS news)--The European Union (EU) must prioritise the greenest biofuels and not worry about whether they are produced internally or imported, EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson will tell an international conference on the product in Brussels on Thursday.

Biofuels are the best available alternative to fossil fuels for transport, and “an important plank in a global strategy [against climate change] and an inevitable part of our future energy mix in Europe,” according to a copy of the speech he is due to deliver.

He adds that “they are no panacea” and that in order to address worries about the demands heavy biofuel production could put on the environment, the EU should prioritise the most environmentally-friendly fuels. 

“Biofuel policy is not ultimately an industrial policy or an agricultural policy - it is an environmental policy, driven above all by the greenest outcomes,” Mandelson says.  

“Europe should be open to accepting that we will import a large part of our biofuel resources...we should certainly not contemplate favouring EU production of biofuels with a weak carbon performance if we can import cheaper, cleaner, biofuels," he argues in the paper.

“Resource nationalism doesn't serve us particularly well in other areas of energy policy. Biofuels are no different,” Mandelson says. 

He adds that the EU will work with developing countries to ensure that biofuels will not be produced in these regions at the expense of the natural environment.

“Europeans won't pay a premium for biofuels if the ethanol in their car is produced unsustainably… or if it comes at the expense of rainforests," Mandelson says.

“We can't allow the switch to biofuels to become an environmentally unsustainable stampede in the developing world,” he says in the paper, adding that research and development into second-generation biofuels is also important to ensure the greenest possible alternatives to fossil fuels are adopted.

By: Philippa Jones
+44 20 8652 3214

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