The UK’s first mass-scale bioethanol factory has finally opened, one month after British MP’s voted to accept the Government’s Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO). Together, these two events turn biofuels from somewhat of an abstract topic in the UK into a very commercial reality. Despite widespread media coverage– which more often than not has focused on their negatives as opposed to their positives – biofuels have largely been confined to niche areas of UK motoring to date.
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The major supermarket chains of Tesco and Morrisons have for some time blended 5% ethanol into some of their petrol supply, but they have never advertised this and have simply sold it as standard unleaded. Meanwhile certain manufacturers – most notably Swedish brand Saab and the UK’s favourite car-buying make Ford have been actively promoting their flex-fuel cars which can run on the much more concentrated blend of bioethanol E85 (85% ethanol and 15% unleaded petrol). Due to scant supply of bioethanol E85 in the UK and the complete absence of any customer incentives for the purchase of these vehicles, however, Saab and Ford sell no more than 300 units per year between them in the UK.
But the situation is rapidly changing. By 2010, one million tonnes of biofuel will be needed if 5% of all petrol and diesel sold in the UK does come from renewable sources as per the Government’s wish. We are told that this move will deliver ‘significant and immediate’ carbon savings, to the tune of between 2.6 and 3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) each year in fact. The RTFO also means that the UK will have one of the most sophisticated and robust biofuel reporting systems in the world, forcing all suppliers to prove that their biofuels have been produced and sourced in a sustainable and CO2 efficient manner.
Last week, British Sugar was proud to announce that the 550,000 tonnes (70 million litres) of bioethanol that it will produce each year in Wissington, Norfolk will have no problems in meeting the government’s stringent sustainability standards.
700,000 tonnes of sugar beet grown on 10,000 hectares of East of England land will be the fuel’s raw material. Importantly, no new land has been turned over for this – previously British Sugar used the beet it now turns into fuel for its staple sugar production, but European Union sugar reforms capped the amount it can produce and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) now prevents it from exporting this surplus supply and ‘dumping’ it on world markets. So instead of putting farmers out of business and closing down some of its manufacturing facilities, British Sugar made a foray into road transport fuel. As of this month, British Sugar will be producing enough ethanol each year for one million cars to run on the government’s stipulated 5% blend.
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By GlobalDataState-of-the-art combined heat and power (CHP) systems utilise excess energy from the adjacent sugar factory (which is the world’s largest and most efficient) to produce ethanol that boasts greenhouse gas savings of between 60 and 70% on a lifecycle basis compared to fossil fuels.
In addition, the site exports 50 m/W electricity back to the national grid, enough to power 200,000 homes in Norfolk, and even uses other excess CO2 gas and hot water from the site to cultivate between 70 and 100 million tomatoes each year, making it one of the UK’s largest tomato producers!
Many more by-products are put to good use instead of wasted at this facility. High quality top soil washed from the beet as it arrives from the fields is sold to end users such as Hyde Park in London, whilst Wissington is also the UK’s biggest animal food production site in the UK on a daily basis, turning the waste fibre from the beet after the sugar has been extracted from it into pellets for farm animals, to name but two examples.
Impressive as these statistics are, however, the truth is that British Sugar’s current efforts are a drop in the ocean in terms of the UK’s biofuel needs, producing little more than 5% of the one million tonnes needed by 2010 for the RTFO. just-auto asked Lord Rooker – the Minister for Sustainable Food and Farming and Animal Health from the Government’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), who attended the factory opening, if the Government has any plans to incentivise further UK production of biofuels. After all, the more biofuel that countries like the United Kingdom can generate themselves for their own needs in a tightly controlled manner, the less they will rely on biofuel supplies from less regulated parts of the world. His answer was a fairly concise no – the government will not be putting any money into UK biofuel production, this is for industry to do.
So what about financial incentives for car drivers then, encouragement to buy Saab and Ford’s flex-fuel cars that offer far greater CO2 savings than cars running on a 5% biofuel blend, or indeed encouragement to purchase other low-emission vehicles on the market? One of the most urgent challenges identified by the Government’s very own King Review, which examines how to take the carbon out of road transport, was the need to “develop a strong and rapidly growing market for low emissions cars.” The conjecture here is that purchasing incentives are the very tool needed to create this market.
“There shouldn’t be any reason to do this,” was Lord Rooker’s rather surprising answer. “As long as the motoring public has absolute confidence in the fuel and sees other cars and buses running on these new types of fuels such as bioethanol E85, there won’t be any problem transferring over.”
Jonathan Nash, Managing Director of Saab Great Britain, which offers a ‘BioPower’ flex-fuel variant across its whole range, expresses his frustration at this approach. “I am surprised by Lord Rooker’s response,” he says.
“It is already evident that in order for consumers to make the right choice, there should be no cost penalty. In this respect, the government does need to support this emerging environmentally-friendly technology. There are examples from all over the world – not least from Saab’s home market of Sweden – showing that financial encouragement is the key to changing consumer behaviour, especially when the technology is relatively new and when you’re dealing with expensive purchases like new cars.”
Despite this perceived lack of assistance, all parties say they will not be thwarted by an unsupportive government and will carry on in their efforts. Saab will carry on lobbying for additional incentives, both for buyers of its own flex-fuel cars and to encourage the domestic production of biofuels in the UK. Likewise, Ford will launch new flex-fuel variants across some of its best-selling cars next year, including the Mondeo and S-Max. British Sugar’s parent company – Associated British Foods (ABF) meanwhile is about to begin construction of a £200 million bioethanol factory in the north of England with oil giant BP and US chemical company DuPont. This factory will dip into the UK’s 2 – 3 million tonne surplus of grain supplies which are currently exported, to produce some 330,000 tonnes of ethanol each year – enough to supply one third of all the cars in the UK with a 5% biofuel blend.
Rebecca Wright
