News

Investment in biofuels in the UK has dried up since a major Parliamentary committee questioned whether or not producing it did more harm than good, says the trade association for environmental technology. The Environmental Industries Commission (EIC) is highly critical of the committee because the EIC says it fails to distinguish between biofuel-produced sustainable and unsustainable ways.

An EIC spokeswoman says: "The problem with this is that they have created a level of uncertainty which  means that nobody is now investing in biofuels." The House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee said this month that "policies that encourage demand for first-generation biofuels are damaging". One of the fears is that the crops grown to make biofuels should be used to make food instead, particularly in Third World countries, where food supply is a critical issue.

The EIC spokeswoman says: "They haven't made any distinction between good biofuel and bad biofuel. Some biofuel is produced from waste, for example, and all the wheat grown for biofuel in the UK is produced in a sustainable fashion." The EIC argues that the committee's strong line has discouraged UK biofuel production, therefore promoting foreign biofuels, which may well be produced less sustainably.

Its spokeswoman argues that the recent rise in food prices, sometimes attributed to biofuels, is much more the result of poor harvests and increased worldwide demand. She says: "Part of the food shortage is  connected to poor rice harvests, and rice is not used for biofuels."