Saint-Cloud, 05/07/2008 (Agence Europe) - The work of the Energy Ministers of the EU, meeting for their informal Council in Saint-Cloud on 4 and 5 July, has revealed a bit of a Community mix-up in the controversial dossier of bio-fuels, which have been accused of contributing globally to deforestation and the hike in food prices. After the meeting of which he was the Chair, the French Minister Jean-Louis Borloo admitted that he, along with his colleagues, "(had) discovered" that no binding objectives for the development of bio-fuels was included in measures to fight climate change, namely the "energy/climate" package tabled by the European Commission last January (EUROPE 9586). The binding minimum objective of 10% of bio-fuels out of total fuel consumption in the transport sector by 2020, as laid down in the draft directive on the promotion and use of renewable energy sources, has been revealed to refer not to bio-fuels alone, but to all renewable energy sources put together! "From renewable energy sources to bio-fuels, that was a semantic shift", a source close to Mr Borloo told EUROPE. In other words, each Member State may include other renewable energy sources, such as hydrogen or electricity, in its objective of 10% of green energy as a share of total energy used in the transport sector. "What was the sustainable solution 18 months ago [bio-fuels: Ed] is now being held up to public scorn", said Mr Borloo. Confirming that "[the ministers] have discovered that the proposal does not refer to bio-fuels, but to renewable energy sources", the German Secretary of State for the Economy, Jochen Homann, also put the role of bio-fuels into perspective and showed great inclination to encourage other sources of energy.
Speaking through the spokesperson to Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, the Commission stressed that its proposal has always included an objective of 10% of renewable energy in the transport sector, but that it was out of a sense of realism that emphasis was laid on green fuels. "Bio-fuels are not the only renewable energy source which can replace oil in transport, but they remain the only short-term solution" which can reduce dependency on oil and fight climate change, Ferran Tarradellas told the press. "We have to be realistic. In order to move the entire fleet of diesel vehicles over to bio-diesel, manufacturers do not need to change the assembly lines in factories. To move over to electricity or hydrogen, on the other hand, would take a revolution", he added, warning that "the door remains open to other sources of energy as long as they are renewable, which is not the case with electricity produced by nuclear power-stations".
This makes-up coincides with the publication by the British daily newspaper The Guardian, on 4 July, of the results of a report by the World Bank alleging that bio-fuels may account for 75% of the increase in food prices since 2002. Taking account of the concerns and criticism related to the development of green fuels, the Twenty-Seven have decided to include sustainability criteria for bio-fuels, which an ad hoc working group of the Council was asked to put together several months ago (EUROPE 9659), in two legislative texts currently under discussion: the proposed "renewables" directive and that on fuel quality. These criteria must be "predictable and reinforced", said Mr Borloo, who took position in favour of a reduction threshold of at least 35% of CO2 emissions compared to classic fuels, in line with the proposal of the Commission, before voicing his wish to toughen up this criterion and see it increased to 50% by 2015. (L.B.S in Saint-Cloud, /E.H./trans.fl)