Climate Change: Growing Doubts Over Chip Fat Biofuel

Climate modification: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research concerns the ecological impact of increasing imports of used cooking oil (UCO) into the UK and Europe.

Chip fat and other oils are thought about waste, so when they are used to make biodiesel it conserves carbon emissions by displacing fossil oil.

But such is the need across Europe that imports now account for majority of the UCO that's made into fuel.

According to the study, external, there's no way to prove these imports are sustainable.

Without any screening of what's can be found in, specialists believe it is also ripe for fraud.

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Reducing emissions from transport is showing to be among the toughest obstacles for governments all over the world.

They have actually motivated using biofuels as an important methods of suppressing carbon from cars and lorries.

Biofuels are normally a mix of nonrenewable fuel source and oil made from plants or veggies.

The fact that these crops can be re-grown and absorb more CO2 indicates they cancel out the carbon released when utilized in engines.

Soy and palm oil were once commonly utilized as parts of biodiesel however this practice has been commonly discredited because it motivates logging.

So for the last years or two, using utilized cooking oil has broadened massively as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have become a crucial element of biodiesel with a reliable market springing up across Europe to collect and process the product.

But with the quantity of biodiesel made from UCO increasing by around 40% every year considering that 2014, there just isn't enough chip fat to walk around.

According to a report from the project group Transport & Environment, external, over half of the UCO used in Europe is imported.

Their study suggests this is extremely troublesome when it comes to effects on the environment.

While UCO is thought about a waste product in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has actually long been utilized to feed animals. The report raises the question of what people in these countries are replacing the UCO with, when it is exported.

In 2019, Malaysia exported 90 million litres of UCO to the UK and Ireland. Figures for their exports to other European countries aren't readily available but the flow of UCO is likely to be comparable.

With a population of around 33 million, that's close to 3 litres per head of utilized oil that's collected and exported to the UK and Ireland alone.

By comparison, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million people, handled to gather around five million litres of UCO in 2019.

"Because we are buying it, they have less utilized cooking oil to use on the things that they were formerly utilizing it for," stated Greg Archer with Transport & Environment.

"And they're simply purchasing more virgin oil and that virgin oil is mainly palm oil, since that's the least expensive oil available.

"So indirectly, we're just motivating more deforestation in Southeast Asia."

Another significant problem with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of need from Europe, the price of UCO is typically higher than palm oil. The concern is that some unscrupulous traders are just diluting deliveries of UCO with palm.

As oils of various types are mixed in bulk for transport, and no testing of the products is performed, some professionals believe fraud is swarming.

The recommendation of scams anywhere along the chain of supply is turned down by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who state there are robust accreditation plans in place.

"It is widely known that the European Commission has actually taken appropriate actions to entirely suppress unsound market practices in biofuel markets," stated Angel Alberdi, EWABA's secretary general.

He says a brand-new database being developed by the EU will ensure that trading, accreditation and sustainability information on all bio-liquids will need to be signed up.

"The mix of modified certification schemes and the pan-EU track and trace database will make sure that no sustainability concerns develop in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he told BBC News.

Others in the field are worried that the database idea, which was very first mooted in 2018, may not work in stemming presumed fraud.

The report from Transport & Environment explains that with shipping and aviation aiming to decarbonise by utilizing biofuels, demand for UCO might double over the next years.

"Rising the need beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and dangers of using 'fake' UCO, possibly resulting in indirect effects such as deforestation."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.