Brussels, 15/02/2010 (Agence Europe) - As provided for in Directive 2009/28/EC on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources, the European Commission will table guidelines on sustainability criteria which biofuels, whether produced in the EU or imported, will have to meet in order to be counted in the binding target set for all member states of 10% of energy from renewables within the total energy consumption in transport in the EU by 2020. The Commission communication, which is expected before the end of March, will set out how member states and companies can comply with the renewable directive, the aim being to ensure that the use of biofuels and bioliquids results in a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions of at least 35% compared with fossil fuels. This threshold will be increased to 50% by 2017 and to 60% by 2018. The exercise undertaken by the Commission requires, in particular, the impact of indirect land use change on greenhouse gas emissions to be measured. The Commission paper, “Communication on the practical implementation of the EU biofuels and bioliquids sustainability scheme and on the counting rules for biofuels” within the 10% target set by Directive 2009/28/EC, defined land use change, so that, for example, turning grasslands into cultivated land would be considered land use change, but not changing from one crop (such as maize) to another (such as rape). The draft text states, too, that biofuels and bioliquids from agricultural, forestry, aquaculture and fisheries residues, such as crude glycerol, animal fats, molasses, manure and sawdust, will count double compared with other raw materials in achieving the 10%. However, biofuels and bioliquids must not come from land that has a high biodiversity value, lands with high carbon stock, wetlands or continuously forested areas, the latter, according to the draft text released at the start of February, includes natural forest, forest plantations and other tree plantations, such as oil palm. Thus, under the terms of the Commission paper, a change from forest to oil palm plantation would not per se constitute a breach of the sustainability criterion. This is a point that has been severely criticised by the NGO Friends of the Earth, which accuses the Commission of encouraging oil palm to the detriment of tropical forests (see EUROPE 10072). (E.H./transl.rt)