By Archie Davies, Head of European Policy Campaigns
Today we have seen progress on an issue that affects wildlife across the globe – biofuels. The link between wildlife and biofuels might not be an obvious one, but it's deep-rooted, linked to the carbon emissions and habitat destruction that biofuels made from crops can fuel.
The European Union has set targets to reduce the amount of carbon pollution produced by the transport sector. One of the main ways governments thought we would be able to do that was by using biofuels. However, the science has unravelled and it has been clearly demonstrated that biofuels can actually produce more carbon emissions than fossil fuels.
What's more, they require vast amounts of land to grow, driving up the cost of food staples like wheat. For example, just this week a new biofuel plant opened near Hull that will need over a million tonnes of wheat each year in spite of the fact that the UK wheat harvest has been hit in recent years by extreme weather, turning us from an exporter into an importer.
As demand for crops for biofuels is cranked up by plants like this one, supply inevitably expands and this is often at the expense of our environment. We’ve been fighting a few of the worst cases ourselves - in East Africa, for example, we’ve helped our partners oppose major biofuel developments in the wildlife-rich Tana River Delta and Dakatcha woodlands (pictured).
All of this reminds us that we need urgent action. Thankfully today some progress was made. The European Union and all its Member States are currently in the process of deciding how to address some of the problems created by existing EU biofuels laws. The European Parliament's Environment Committee voted today to limit the amount of crop-based biofuels that can be used to meet European targets. Just as importantly, they voted to update the science used to calculate the amount of carbon pollution these crops create. This is vital – it should mean that the worst biofuels are phased out, while newer, cleaner, cleverer technologies can come on stream.
There's lots of work still to be done. The full European Parliament will vote in the autumn, and their conclusions will be critical. At the same time, the UK government and its European partners need to get their acts together to agree a position which would stop the harm being done to people, the environment, and the climate by outdated biofuels policies. Today the European Parliament took a step in the right direction, but we're not there yet.