by Sean Goulding Carroll (EURACTIV.com) The amount of bioenergy in the EU’s transport sector will increase under plans by the lawmaker leading the European Parliament’s position on the EU’s renewable energy law, a scenario likely to rankle green legislators.
Markus Pieper, the centre-right German MEP in charge of the file, has proposed higher sub-targets for advanced biofuels and the removal of certain restrictions on crop-based biofuels to meet the EU’s renewable energy goal.
Pieper has pushed up the renewable electricity and fuel greenhouse gas reduction target in the transport sector from 13% to 20% by 2030, intending to incentivise advanced biofuels and synthetic fuels.
The share of advanced biofuels and biogas in the transport sector has correspondingly been increased from a minimum of 0.2% in 2022, 0.5% in 2025, and 2.2% in 2030, to at least 0.4% in 2022, 1% in 2025, and 5% in 2030.
Targets for low-carbon hydrogen are additionally introduced, with a share of at least 2.6% in 2028 and 5% in 2030.
The rule that member states may not exceed one percentage point more than the 2020 share of crop-based biofuels in their transport sector is removed, but the 7% energy consumption cap remains.
Deforestation concerns
Food-and-feed based biofuels have become a target for environmentalists in recent years, with fears raised that the bloc’s demand for specific biofuel feedstocks is driving deforestation outside of Europe and may diminish food supply.
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However, the Pieper report states that the question of deforestation caused by an indirect land-use change (ILUC) was “fully addressed” by a 2018 delegated act that effectively banned palm oil as a feedstock in the EU.
Asked by EURACTIV about the criticism put forward by Deutsche Umwelthilfe, MEP Pieper pointed to other studies “that prove exactly the opposite”.
“I do not believe that this competition between biofuel and food or feed crops still exists in Europe,” he said.
“However, I also agree with many environmentally oriented NGOs that we need to take a much closer look in other parts of the world before we import biomass and components of biofuels into Europe,” he added.
Given the EU’s ambitious renewable energy targets, Pieper argues that using by-products and waste from agriculture is sensible to support the energy transition. However, he remains opposed to the replacement of agriculture with energy crops.
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“I don’t understand why biofuels and energy from plants shouldn’t be used in the transport sector. There’s no logical reason,” he said.
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“There are also indirect effects from deforestation, soil compaction and flight effects from new wind turbines and also land-use conflicts from solar parks,” the amended text reads.
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Santos (André Paula Santos, public affairs director with the European Biodiesel Board) said he is “puzzled” by the attacks on biofuels given the urgent need to displace fossil fuels, arguing that pushing ever-stricter sustainability criteria for biodiesel results in a greater reliance on climate-wrecking oil.
“I’ve seen proposals from a number of MEPs to put the greenhouse gas reduction threshold at 70%. That means that a biofuel that saves 50%, or 55%, or 60% would be out. And I still think that saving 50% is good,” he said.
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“A cap for us is never a good solution because it doesn’t ensure the sustainability of anything,” he said. “If a biofuel is sustainable, if there’s strong sustainability criteria, if there’s strong verification from the certification schemes, then, in fact, that cap doesn’t make much sense.” READ MORE
German study slams crop-based biofuels as ‘a cure worse than the disease’ (EurActiv)
Key lawmaker pushes 10% ‘low-carbon hydrogen’ target in EU renewables law (EurActiv)
Excerpt from EurActiv: The lawmaker in charge of drafting the European Parliament’s position on the EU’s recast renewable energy directive is pushing to include a 10% target for “low-carbon hydrogen” as part of efforts to kick-start the EU market.
The European Commission seeks to ramp up clean hydrogen production in the EU, with at least 40 gigawatts of new electrolysers expected to produce up to 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen by 2030 – mainly coming from wind and solar.
The aim is for renewable hydrogen technologies to reach maturity by 2050 so that they can be deployed at scale across all hard-to-decarbonise sectors, such as chemicals and steelmaking.
Yet, ramping up volumes of green hydrogen will take years, said Markus Pieper, a German lawmaker for the conservative European People’s Party who steers the European Parliament’s position on the EU’s recast renewable energy directive.
“Many scientists say that by 2030 we will not be able to achieve the 50% target of green hydrogen for industry,” Pieper told EURACTIV in an interview.
“If the amount of hydrogen is not sufficient in the foreseeable future, the rest will be grey hydrogen, which will mean that we will miss our CO2 targets,” he warned, referring to hydrogen produced from natural gas, which produces climate-warming emissions.
“This is why I would like to have a 10% target for low-carbon hydrogen so that it can act as a bridge and can meet our CO2 emissions reduction obligations as well,” Pieper said.
Low-carbon hydrogen can come from two sources. It can either be produced from fossil gas with carbon capture and storage (CCS) to bury the related CO2 emissions (“blue” hydrogen), or from electrolysers running on nuclear power (“pink” hydrogen).
But including those in the EU’s renewable energy directive is a non-starter for the Greens who say nuclear and gas have nothing to do with renewables.
“The renewable directive must not be used to promote nuclear power,” said Michael Bloss, a German EU lawmaker from the Green party in the European Parliament.
“Low-carbon means that nuclear hydrogen can also count towards the industry and transport target. We need full power for renewables now, not a softening of the directive,” he told EURACTIV.
Pieper refuted those claims, saying the 10% target for low-carbon hydrogen will not count towards the EU’s renewable energy objective.
Earlier this month, he called for raising the share of renewables in the EU’s energy mix in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. His proposal is to aim for 45% renewables by 2030, higher than the Commission’s initial 40% target plan. READ MORE