Climate change: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research study concerns the environmental impact of increasing imports of utilized cooking oil (UCO) into the UK and Europe.

Chip fat and other oils are considered waste, so when they are utilized to make biodiesel it saves carbon emissions by displacing fossil oil.

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

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

Without any screening of what's coming in, professionals think it is likewise ripe for fraud.

Used cooking oil imports might increase deforestation

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Reducing emissions from transport is proving to be among the hardest difficulties for governments all over the world.

They have actually encouraged making use of biofuels as a crucial methods of suppressing carbon from cars and trucks and trucks.

Biofuels are generally a mix of fossil fuel and oil made from plants or veggies.

The truth that these crops can be re-grown and soak up more CO2 implies they counteract the carbon emitted when utilized in engines.

Soy and palm oil were once widely used as parts of biodiesel but this practice has actually been extensively rejected because it motivates deforestation.

So for the last years or two, the usage of utilized cooking oil has broadened enormously as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have become a crucial element of biodiesel with a reliable industry emerging across Europe to collect and process the item.

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

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

Their research study recommends this is extremely problematic when it pertains to influence on the environment.

While UCO is considered a waste product in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has actually long been utilized to feed animals. The report raises the concern of what people in these nations are changing 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 however the flow of UCO is most likely to be similar.

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

By contrast, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million individuals, handled to collect around 5 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 previously using it for," stated Greg Archer with Transport & Environment.

"And they're just purchasing more virgin oil and that virgin oil is largely palm oil, since that's the most affordable oil offered.

"So indirectly, we're just encouraging more logging in Southeast Asia."

Another major issue with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of need from Europe, the cost of UCO is typically greater than palm oil. The concern is that some unscrupulous traders are merely 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 specialists think fraud is swarming.

The suggestion of scams anywhere along the chain of supply is turned down by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who say there are robust certification schemes in place.

"It is commonly understood that the European Commission has actually taken appropriate steps to totally suppress unsound market practices in biofuel markets," said Angel Alberdi, EWABA's secretary general.

He states a new database being developed by the EU will guarantee that trading, certification and sustainability data on all bio-liquids will have to be registered.

"The combination of modified accreditation plans and the pan-EU track and trace database will guarantee that no sustainability problems develop in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he told BBC News.

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

The report from Transport & Environment mentions that with shipping and aviation aiming to decarbonise by using biofuels, need for UCO could double over the next years.

"Rising the demand beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these issues, and threats of utilizing 'phony' UCO, potentially leading to indirect impacts such as deforestation."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

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