24 May 2011
Leading countries have agreed a set of sustainability indicators to inform the production and use of bioenergy, meeting repeated requests from the G8 for such guidelines. The indicators have been developed by the Global Bioenergy Partnership (GBEP), which brings together 23 countries, including the members of the G8, China and Brazil, plus a number of international bodies.The GBEP said the agreement “marks the first global, government-level consensus on a set of voluntary, science-based indicators for assessing the sustainable production and use of bioenergy."
The move by the GBEP – which was first proposed at the 2005 G8 meeting in Gleneagles, Scotland – is in response to ongoing controversy about the impact of biofuel production on food prices and the contribution of some biofuels, such as ethanol from corn or biodiesel from palm oil, to greenhouse gas emissions.
“There’s good and bad bioenergy production in the world,” spokesman James Osborne told Environmental Finance. “This is a way to discriminate between them, and to come to a common basis to determine which is good and which is bad.”
The GBEP has agreed on 24 indicators, including the impact of bioenergy production and use on greenhouse gas emissions, biological diversity, the price and supply of a national food basket, access to energy, economic development and energy security.
They do not set thresholds or limits, “and do not constitute a standard”, the GBEP said, nor are they legally binding.
“Sustainability is key to ensure that bioenergy will reach its potential,” said Corrado Clini, GBEP chairman and director general of Italy’s environment ministry. “It’s crucial that producing energy from biomass does not compete with food production: energy crops should be in addition to, and not substitute, food crops.
“These GBEP sustainability indicators can help provide consumers with the certainty that the production and use of bioenergy benefits the environment, contributes to social and economic development, and in no way impairs the availability of food,” he added.
The indicators cover both biofuels and biomass for electricity production.
As well as 23 national governments, the European Commission, the International Energy Agency, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the World Business Council for Sustainable Development and international development banks are members of GBEP, among other organisations.
Source: Mark Nicholls, Environmental Finance website