Filed under: Biodiesel, Ethanol, Europe/EU
The European Commission says no to reviewing biofuel percentage goal
As you might know, the EU has plans to make a 10 percent blend of biofuels mandatory in 2020. However, not everybody agrees that it's a good measure. In fact, lots of voices have been raised in warning about using biofuels to reduce our dependence on oil. Nevertheless, the European Commission said on Monday that there is no intention to review such the 10 percent target. Barbara Helfferich, European Commissioner for Environmental Affairs, stated that even though the EC knows that biofuels are associated with "problems," the EC is developing legislation to guarantee their sustainability.
Moreover, the European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Environment said that Europe expects to assign 17 percent of available farmland for biofuels to reach the 10 percent goal. These acres wouldn't affect food production, he said. He also said that the some of the newest European Union members, such as Bulgaria, Bulgaria and Romania, could even help reduce this global percentage due to their large areas of unused land. However, he also stated that the EC will review its agriculture policy, which will likely imply less subventions for biofuel crops.
[Source: Europa Press via Econoticias]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
GreyFlcn 6:59PM (4/15/2008)
Basically "We don't care what science says about biofuels being bad, we're gonna do it anyways, to defeat global warming which the scientists told us about."
That, or it's just argicultural pork, plus a lame attempt at current politicians trying to raise their poll numbers by doing something which atleast superficially seems like a good idea.
Kind of like Hydrodren, or Carbon Sequestration.
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TheSUBWAY.com 11:11AM (4/16/2008)
We found an interesting article about the problems with Ethanol on ConsumerReports.org:
http://blogs.consumerreports.org/cars/2008/03/ethanol-e85.html
"But there are some problems with increasing ethanol blends. Ethanol contains less energy than gasoline, so increasing the amount of ethanol in gasoline will likely result in lower fuel economy. Increasing standard fuel blends from zero to 10 percent ethanol, as is happening today, has little or no impact on fuel economy. In tests, the differences occur within the margin of error, about 0.5 percent. Further increasing ethanol levels to 20 percent reduces fuel economy between 1 and 3 percent, according to testing by the DOE and General Motors. Evaluations are underway to determine if E20 will burn effectively in today's engines without impacting reliability and longevity, and also assessing potential impact on fuel economy."
TheSUBWAY.com would like to invite readers to post their own views and ideas in TheSUBWAY.com's Investor Forum:
http://investor-forum.thesubway.com/
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RRMS 7:37PM (4/18/2008)
The biofuels is not the solutions, we can make vehicle not need fuel, I think the electromagnetic motor is the solution….
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