Charles Abel says
Significantly, the NFU estimates that the UK has sufficient land available to meet the RTFO (Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation) target for 2010. About 5% of UK petrol supply would be provided by the bioethanol equivalent of 3m tonnes of wheat, about the same amount as we export. We also need about 5% of diesel use, which could be met by 2.7m tonnes of oilseed rape, roughly equivalent to reserves of set-aside and fallow land.
It would not be surprising if the same situation is replicated over Europe. Currently farmers are paid to leave land fallow under a process called set aside. Golf courses are one use for the land, industrial crops would be another. Europe's farmers are pretty keen to be able to get something useful off set aside land, as I wrote about earlier this month.