Whatever Happened to Biofuels?

Discovery

BBC

Science

4.3 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 21 April 2014

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Biofuels were hailed as the environmental solution to fossil fuels not that long ago. Made from living crops they take up carbon dioxide as they grow. So burning them shouldn’t disturb the balance of warming gases in the atmosphere.

But for the last few years the publicity about biofuels has been mainly negative. And for good reason – biofuels are made from crops such as oil palm - grown in place of food crops or even rainforests. In some cases using these crops actually produces more CO2 than burning fossil fuels. However research is being done into new kinds of biofuels that aren’t in competition with food crops.

Gaia Vince travels to Bavaria in Germany to meet Dr Markus Rarbach, head of biofuels at Clariant. This company has set up a demonstration plant that produces ethanol from sugars in the waste products of wheat grown nearby.

Also on the programme is professor Gregory Tucker from Nottingham University who talks about research into new ways of getting sugars out of the inedible parts of crops; agricultural economist, Dr Paul Wilson, discusses what farmers think about making biofuels out of their straw; and Dr Angela Karp at Rothamsted Research, who is growing new willow varieties, which could be made into biofuels.

Image Credit: Clariant

Transcript

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0:33.0	The details of our complete range of podcasts and our terms of use,
0:37.0	go to BBCworldservice.com slash podcasts.
0:40.0	The European Union policy of encouraging plant fuels for cars has been condemned as unethical by a leading independent research organisation.
0:51.0	The Nuffield Council on Bioethics says biofuels are damaging the environment
0:56.1	and pushing up food prices.
0:58.0	African biofuels destined for Europe will result in up to six times the carbon emissions of fossil fuels.
1:04.0	That's according to a report commissioned by the RSPB, Action Aid and Nature Kenya.
1:09.0	The report focuses on the Decatur Woodlands in Kenya, which are set to be destroyed to make way for Jutrofer
1:15.9	plantations.
1:16.9	Biofuels were hailed as the environmental solution to fossil fuels not that long ago. Made from living crops they take up carbon dioxide as they
1:26.3	grow so burning them shouldn't disturb the balance of warming gases in the atmosphere.
1:31.9	But for the last few years the publicity about biofuels has been
1:35.5	mainly negative and for good reason biofuels are made from energy crops like oil palm
	...

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