EU liquid biofuel use 'could treble' by 2030

The use of liquid biofuels in the EU could triple by 2030 compared with 2010 levels to reach 66 billion litres despite a forecast rise in the use of electric vehicles, a report prepared for the European Commission found this week.

The report, which was researched by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), concludes that even though most passenger vehicles sold in the bloc could be fully electric or hybrid by 2030, non combustion-engined vehicles would only account for 16% of the overall car stock in Europe.

“Even with such quick adoption of electric vehicles, renewable power would only account for about 3% of the energy consumption in the sector by 2030," said IRENA’s report entitled ‘Renewable Energy Prospects for the European Union’.

"Liquid biofuels – both advanced and conventional – will still be needed for the existing stock of vehicles with internal combustion engines and for transport modes where electrification is still not an option,” the report said.

The report was released ahead of the ‘Trialogue’ between the EC, the European Parliament and member states on the recast of the EU’s renewable energy directive, which gets underway next week and is expected to finalise legislation by November.

But calibrating targets for renewable energy as a share of overall road transport will be tricky, as governments are keen to preserve a 7% threshold for crop-based biofuels while EU parliamentarians are keen to cap their use at a much lower level and mandate a much bigger share for advanced biofuels and electric vehicles.

Member states want renewable transport to have a target of 14% of renewable energy consumed in the EU by 2030, while parliamentarians have voted for 10%. 

Thus estimates and expectations on the uptake of electric transport will be a critical consideration for the EC as it attempts to act as an “honest broker” in Trialogue.

These talks will have to balance the views of richer member states pushing for a fast roll-out of EVs with poorer mainly agrarian states where the penetration of fully electric or hybrid vehicles is expected to be lowest.      

IRENA, which is an international organisation set up to promote renewable energy, based its bullish forecast for biofuels on what it calls a ‘REmap scenario’ – through EU member states deploy “realistic renewable energy potential at the sector and technology levels” compared with a reference case.

The report said that despite the challenges involved in deploying transport biofuels, the EU has potential for significant uptake, pointing out that in its REmap case, the renewable energy share in transport associated with biofuels (i.e excluding renewable electricity use in the sector) could reach 14%, up from around 4% in 2015.

IRENA's REmap scenario is based on the assumption that the EU could double its renewable energy supply (RES) share from 17% in 2015 to 34% in 2030, if the European Commission’s proposal on 30% energy efficiency savings is realised.

In the reference case, the figure would be around 8% by 2030, IRENA said.  

The EC last year proposed a phase-out of food and feed-based biofuels from 7% to 3.8% in 2030 and proposed a minimum share of advanced biofuels (not food based), to be increased gradually from at least 0.5% in 2021 to at least 3.6% in 2030.

Uncertainty

But the IRENA report said that “significant additional policy effort needs to be allocated to accelerate investments in advanced biofuel production in the EU from now until 2030,” if these fuels are to replace crop-based biofuels.

“Uncertainty about future policies hindered additional investments. Thus, growth of production and consumption of biofuels in the EU has slowed down and several advanced biofuels projects have been subject to delays or cancelled,” IRENA added.

EU policies should maintain support for the production and use of sustainably sourced first-generation biofuels, the report added.

Stability

It also recommended that allocation of biofuels should prioritise uses for which there are no renewable technology alternatives available, for example road freight, aviation and shipping.

IRENA said that because transport is the main sector where renewables deployment is impacted by low crude oil prices, biofuels producers need long-term stable and predictable policies that would protect them from price volatility and changing market trends.

Quoting 2017 figures from the EC’s statistics agency Eurostat, IRENA said biodiesel accounting for 80% of biofuel consumption in the EU, with bioethanol accounting for 19% of the EU biofuel market.