Climate modification: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research questions the environmental impact of increasing imports of utilized 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 throughout Europe that imports now account for more than half of the UCO that’s made into fuel.

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

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

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Reducing emissions from transport is showing to be one of the hardest challenges for governments all over the world.

They have actually motivated using biofuels as a crucial means of suppressing carbon from automobiles and lorries.

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

The reality that these crops can be re-grown and soak up more CO2 suggests they cancel out the carbon produced when used in engines.

Soy and palm oil were once extensively used as components of biodiesel but this practice has been commonly challenged because it motivates deforestation.

So for the last decade or so, the usage of used cooking oil has broadened massively as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have actually become a key element of biodiesel with a reliable industry springing up throughout Europe to gather and process the item.

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

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

Their study suggests this is extremely troublesome when it pertains to influence on the environment.

While UCO is thought about a waste product in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has actually long been used 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 offered but the flow of UCO is most likely to be comparable.

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

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

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

“And they’re just buying more virgin oil which virgin oil is largely palm oil, since that’s the most affordable oil offered.

“So indirectly, we’re just motivating more deforestation in Southeast Asia.”

Another significant problem with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of demand from Europe, the rate of UCO is often greater than palm oil. The worry is that some unscrupulous traders are merely watering down deliveries of UCO with palm.

As oils of various types are blended in bulk for transportation, and no screening of the materials is performed, some professionals believe fraud is rife.

The tip of fraud anywhere along the chain of supply is rejected by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who state there are robust accreditation schemes in place.

“It is widely known that the European Commission has taken relevant steps to entirely suppress unsound market practices in biofuel markets,” said Angel Alberdi, EWABA’s secretary general.

He says a new database being established by the EU will ensure that trading, accreditation and sustainability data on all bio-liquids will have to be registered.

“The mix of revised accreditation schemes and the pan-EU track and trace database will guarantee that no sustainability problems occur in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain,” he informed BBC News.

Others in the field are worried that the database concept, which was first mooted in 2018, might not be effective in stemming presumed fraud.

The report from Transport & Environment points out that with shipping and air travel seeking to decarbonise by utilizing biofuels, need for UCO could double over the next years.

“Rising the demand beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and risks of utilizing ‘fake’ UCO, possibly causing indirect such as deforestation.”

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

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