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Climate modification: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research questions 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 over half of the UCO that's made into fuel.

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

With no testing of what's being available in, specialists think it is also ripe for scams.

Used cooking oil imports might increase logging

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Reducing emissions from transportation is showing to be one of the hardest difficulties for governments all over the world.

They've encouraged making use of biofuels as an essential means of suppressing carbon from vehicles and trucks.

Biofuels are usually a blend of nonrenewable fuel source and oil made from plants or veggies.

The truth that these crops can be re-grown and take in more CO2 implies they cancel out the carbon given off when utilized in engines.

Soy and palm oil were as soon as extensively utilized as components of biodiesel but this practice has actually been widely discredited because it motivates logging.

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

Chip fat and other waste oils have actually become an essential part of biodiesel with a reliable industry emerging throughout Europe to and process the item.

But with the amount of biodiesel made from UCO increasing by around 40% every year considering that 2014, there merely isn't sufficient chip fat to walk around.

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

Their study recommends this is highly problematic when it comes to effects on the environment.

While UCO is thought about a waste material in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has actually long been used to feed animals. The report raises the question 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 but the flow of UCO is most likely to be comparable.

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

By comparison, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million individuals, handled to gather around five million litres of UCO in 2019.

"Because we are purchasing it, they have actually less used cooking oil to utilize on the things that they were previously using it for," stated Greg Archer with Transport & Environment.

"And they're just buying more virgin oil and that virgin oil is mainly palm oil, because that's the most inexpensive oil available.

"So indirectly, we're simply encouraging more deforestation in Southeast Asia."

Another significant problem with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of need from Europe, the price of UCO is often greater than palm oil. The concern is that some unethical traders are just diluting shipments of UCO with palm.

As oils of different types are blended in bulk for transport, and no testing of the materials is brought out, some professionals think fraud is rife.

The suggestion of fraud anywhere along the chain of supply is rejected by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who state there are robust certification plans in place.

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

He says a new database being developed by the EU will make sure that trading, accreditation and sustainability data on all bio-liquids will have to be registered.

"The mix of revised certification plans and the pan-EU track and trace database will make sure that no sustainability concerns develop in the whole biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he told BBC News.

Others in the field are concerned that the database concept, which was first mooted in 2018, may not be effective in stemming believed scams.

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

"Rising the demand beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and dangers of utilizing 'phony' UCO, potentially causing indirect effects such as deforestation."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

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