An image of two freight ships

Full steam ahead?

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Environmental impacts of expanding the supply of maritime biofuels for the International Maritime Organisation targets

The UN’s International Maritime Organisation (IMO) is in the process of evaluating proposals for binding targets aimed at decarbonising international shipping. Whatever the ultimate form of this regulation, there will likely be significant implications for the production of biofuels for shipping. Until now, these have played only a minor role in the maritime fuel mix, and there is a risk that the IMO will repeat the mistakes of past fuel policies in other sectors.

This report for Transport and Environment examines and models potential environmental consequences of such a shift, and concludes with policy recommendations for mitigating the worst impacts of biofuel feedstock consumption as well as for reducing future overall demand for maritime fuel.

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Fuelling nature

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How e-fuels can mitigate biodiversity risk in EU aviation and maritime policy

This report, commissioned by Opportunity Green on behalf of the Skies and Seas Hydrogen-fuels Accelerator Coalition (SASHA), explores the biodiversity risks associated with the EU’s efforts to decarbonise aviation and maritime transport. The ReFuelEU Aviation and FuelEU Maritime regulations aim to engender a rapid transition away from fossil fuels and towards alternative fuels; but this raises concerns for nature protection, potentially undermining the EU’s biodiversity commitments under the Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 and the Nature Restoration Regulation. Cerulogy’s report assesses how different fuel pathways – biofuels from crops, residues and waste oils, and synthetic e-fuels – compare in terms of pressure on land, habitats, species, and ecosystems.

Cerulogy modelled alternative fuel demand in the aviation and maritime segments to 2050. We considered four scenarios representing different dominant fuel production technologies: cellulosic residues, cellulosic crops, lipids, and electrofuels. For each scenario, we estimated feedstock and land requirements, and developed a biodiversity risk framework to evaluate land-use change, habitat degradation, species loss, pollution, and agrochemical use. To assess policy coherence, we examined trade-offs and synergies between the EU’s transport decarbonisation goals and its nature and biodiversity policy framework.

Our findings show that, while all fuel pathways carry some environmental risk, electrofuels may represent the lowest overall risk to biodiversity, largely due to their minimal land footprint and reduced pressure on ecosystems, species, and habitats. Even biofuels derived from residues and wastes may have implications for nature when scaled to meet growing fuel demand. The EU’s current approach risks locking in high-impact fuel systems unless it also addresses total energy use in aviation and shipping. Until policymakers are ready to confront demand growth in these hard-to-decarbonise sectors, support for options like electrofuels may be the clearest path for the EU to aligning its climate and biodiversity goals.

Download the report from the SASHA website
The cover image for 'The fat of the land'; cows and round Cerulogy chickens are pictured in front of an industrial facility.Cerulogy, 2023

The fat of the land

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This study for the European Federation for Transport and the Environment (T&E) reviews the use of rendered animal fats by the EU biofuel industry, the impacts of this use on other animal fat consumers and the potential for this diversion of resources to cause indirect emissions. As featured on BBC news! You can read a press release by T&E based on the study here and an associated BBC news article here.

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We didn’t start the fire!

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This report for Transport and Environment reviews the role of biomass based energy in scenarios for meeting EU and global climate change targets.

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Beyond biomass?

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Within the European Union’s recast Renewable Energy Directive support is available not only to biofuels but also to ‘renewable fuels of non-biological origin’ (electrofuels) and to ‘recycled carbon fuels’ (fuels produced taking advantage of fossil energy in solid and gaseous waste streams).

This report for the International Council on Clean Transportation provides an introduction to the main issues in sustainability and lifecycle analysis associated with supporting these novel fuels.

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Building the Perfect Beast: Designing Advanced Alternative Fuel Policy to Work

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Cerulogy attended Biomass Conference and Exhibition in Copenhagen this year (2018) to present a paper on building more effective policy for advanced alternative fuel commercialisation. The paper is now available in the conference proceedings, or you can download it below.

Abstract

Since the year 2000, grand aspirations have been set for the development of a new advanced alternative fuel industry, but targets have repeatedly been missed and deployment of new facilities has delivered only a tiny fraction of the fuel production forecast by the most ambitious policies. This paper argues that one of the main reasons for this shortfall between goals and achievement is the use of policy frameworks that have not been designed to provide long-term value certainty. The setting of energetic targets for the supply of advanced alternative fuels was intended to give the market the flexibility to choose the lowest cost solutions. Instead, the value-uncertainty built into such policies as a feature has contributed to an investment environment in which high capital expenditure projects using new technologies are profoundly disadvantaged compared to high operational expenditure fuel production at first generation plants. The market has thus failed to deliver the best value long-term solutions. An alternative policy framework is proposed in which credits would be awarded for advanced alternative fuel production, and fuel suppliers would be required to support that production by buying all available credits at the end of the year at a prescribed price. That price would be fixed up to an annual supply target; beyond that annual supply target, the per-credit price would be scaled down in proportion to the degree of over-achievement in supply, allowing a firm cap to be set on the cost of support to fuel consumers. While the market would be able to expand supply until the adjusted credit price reflected marginal production costs, the high levels of price variability in existing biofuel credit markets would be avoided. It is argued that such a framework could be much more effective at driving investment than a simple mandate, while avoiding excessive costs for fuel suppliers or consumers.

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Waste not want not

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The controversy around the use of food and feed commodities for biofuel has led to an increasing focus on opportunities to produce biofuels from wastes, residues and by-products. However, where those materials have existing productive uses, redirecting them into energy recovery applications may cause displacement and indirect emissions. This study for the International Council on Clean Transportation considers the potential indirect emissions profiles of a variety of materials that may be considered for additional incentives in EU biofuel policy beyond 2020.

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Cover image from 'Waste not want not'