Legislative uncertainty in the energy market is undermining the investment potential and a potentially low-carbon future when it comes to the development of bioethanol, the industry is claiming.
The industry, which bills itself as being both capable of producing food and fuel, has had a hard time distinguishing itself from the biofuels industry, which has come under fire for being, unlike its original claim, detrimental to the environment, not to mention its contribution to the argument that it decreases land space for food production, and that the industry is blighted with unscrupulous practitioners, who strip the earth of its natural, carbon-absorbing resources.
“The challenge is massive”, admits Gareth Jones, commercial director of Vireol, the UK's leading representative of the bioethanol industry, of the task ahead; the twin challenge of persuading European political and business leaders that their industry is not in conflict with environmental concerns, and that it deserves some form of support.
Europe, and the UK in particular, should be leading the advancement of the bioethanol industry, says Jones, but it has a hard time distinguishing itself right now from conventional biofuels (Vireol bills itself as representing “good biofuels”), which have been accused of destroying palm crops and rainforests in Indonesia and Brazil. In contrast, wheat-based bioethanol will bio refine wheat, while at the same time produce sustainable fuel.
Bioethanol is what can be described as a “category 4” production, continues Jones, which comes from feed wheat. Production facilities in the UK are seen less as chemical factories than “food and fuel plants”. This kind of bioethanol, he says, “can make a very positive contribution to the food versus fuel debate”.
The question, he says, of 'is there every going to be enough wheat' is down to better farmland husbandry. The UK, he claims, has the potential to produce a 50% uplift in current yield, to 12 tonnes per hectare from the usual 8. “Europe has a massive potential to do this. In doing so, we can sort out e vironmental problems, and fuel security”.
As for damaging practices in the biofuel industry, he says that Europe should simply “punish the bad ones, and encourage the good ones”; there are, he insists, good and bad biofuels, “it's as simple as that”, he says.
But, the bioethanol instustry, admits
Gareth Jones, is still an “embryonic one”, and much work, not least in lobbying, still needs to be done. Encouraged by developments in the UK, the production of a new state of the art production facility built in 2013 will see the industry contribute to national targets in non-traditional transport fuels, he believes that momentum is on the side of bioethanol.
If only they could get over this current hurdle. But, as he says, all it takes is a little willingness, a little adventure; after all, “no one ever got the sack for not making a deal”.
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