“Unbundling” the biofuel promise: Querying the ability of liquid biofuels to deliver on socio-economic policy expectations

Hunsberger, Carol; German, Laura; Goetz, Ariane

doi:10.1016/j.enpol.2017.04.017

Cited by 44 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 59 publications

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“…Although attractive, the policy expectations for biofuel in the EU (e.g. GHG emissions reduction, domestic energy security, agro-industrial development) are difficult to achieve together in particular if vague or narrowly defined in regulations, as suggested by Hunsberger et al (2017). Indeed, as shown in the empirical results, the efficacy and efficiency of environmental-friendly biofuel policies may depend on the interactions among biofuel feedstock markets.…”

Section: Concluding and Policy Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Price responsiveness of supply and acreage in the EU vegetable oil markets: Policy implications

2021

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Vegetable oil market is becoming of increasing interest in the global biofuel industry. This phenomenon has also interested the European Union (EU), where the growing expansion of biofuel production is affected by political interventions promoting fuel security and environmental goals. Yet, empirical evidence on the impacts that changes in price of one commodity may have on the supply of another commodity are rather scant. We investigate these dynamics for the major sources of biodiesel in the EU and conclude on cross-commodity linkages for palm, rapeseed, soy, and sunflower oils. We also examine the acreage response of domestically produced feedstocks to changes in prices of vegetable oils. Our findings suggest strong and diversified path dependencies among vegetable oils that should be considered in planning sustainable biofuel policies. In particular, the empirical analysis reveals the great relevance of sunflower and soy oils, which show a high price responsiveness, and the high competition in end uses of domestically produced vegetable oils (i.e. rapeseed, soy, and sunflower oils), that tend to be net substitutes in supply. In terms of land use effects, we find that an increase in the price of imported palm oil results in a displacement effect in land devoted to rapeseed cultivation, whereas a surge in the price of sunflower oil decreases the use of land for rapeseed. Land use effects would be relevant in northern EU countries where the production of rapeseed is the most intense. A policy measure in the EU, incentivising the production of renewable and environmental-friendly fuel from sustainable feedstocks, would be positive for the domestic market to the extent that it stimulates the production of vegetable oils (soy and sunflower oils) with the highest direct and indirect emissions saving. However, the expansion of oil palm plantations in extra-EU producing countries and of imports to the EU would determine important impacts in terms of indirect land use change emissions and direct emissions due to increased transports.

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Section: Concluding and Policy Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Price responsiveness of supply and acreage in the EU vegetable oil markets: Policy implications

2021

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“…Specifically, over the time period 2000-2016, global biofuel use increased by 668% reaching a total of 2.3 million barrels per day (EIA 2020a). Previous studies confirm that the biofuel blending mandates have contributed to this rapid growth (Hunsberger et al 2017;Lamers et al 2011;Swinbank et al 2011). Moreover, existing literature also shows that both blending mandates and government R&D have assisted in inducing technological development in the biofuel field, typically measured through patenting activity (Costantini et al 2015;Brolund and Lundmark 2014;Karmarkar-Deshmukh and Pray 2009;Palage et al 2019a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 86%

“…2). In the former case, many countries have adopted so-called biofuel blending mandates requiring a minimum percentage of biofuels in transport fuels sold to the consumers at the pump (Hunsberger et al 2017). 2 Such policies can be expected to stabilize the domestic demand for biofuels, something that in turn could encourage new investment in the sector (Charles et al 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Green industrial policies and domestic production of biofuels: an econometric analysis of OECD countries

Bryngemark

Söderholm

2021

Environ Econ Policy Stud

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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between green industrial policies and domestic biofuel production among OECD countries. The analysis builds on a data set including 24 OECD countries over the time period 2000–2016. This panel is estimated using a variant of the so-called Poisson pseudo-maximum-likelihood model and includes the mix of demand-pull (biofuel blending mandates) and technology-push policies (government R&D), as well as the interaction between these two types of instruments. The results suggest a positive relationship between blending mandates and domestic biofuel production. Thus, a more stringent blending mandate does not only increase the use of biofuels, but also domestic production (as a share of total fuel use). Government R&D has not, however, induced domestic biofuel industrialization processes. The results even suggest a negative interaction effect between government R&D and blending mandates, in turn implying that these two polices target different technological fields. The blending mandates tend to primarily favor commercialized first-generation biofuels, while government support to biofuel R&D has instead been focused on advanced biofuel technology.

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“…First, biofuel research, development, and production have been mostly linked to consolidated agricultural sectors rather than small-scale agriculture or strategies that target the poor. Vulnerable groups and energy poverty are regularly evoked to justify bioenergy promotion (Von Braun and Pachauri 2006;Hunsberger et al 2017), yet the growing volume of biofuels produced mostly go to higher-income consumers (automobile users) rather than to the hundreds of millions still lacking access to modern energy. Second, developing countries have usually been allocated only the natural resource-intensive stage (feedstock cultivation) of bio-based production chains, the one of least economic value.…”

Section: Equity: Access and Allocation Patternsmentioning

confidence: 99%

International Bioeconomy Governance: Unveiling the Initial Patterns

Lima¹,

Mairon²

2021

The Politics of Bioeconomy and Sustainability

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Bioeconomy governance builds on that of biofuels, its most prominent sector thus far. Biofuels' transnational drivers and impacts have received substantive international attention, raising the prospects of global policy action to address sustainability concerns. However, biofuel governance has been marked by the preeminence of national policies and the thinness of multilateral institutions. The international biofuel policy context has been characteristically non-intrusive and neoliberal. There is a shared view among major producer countries-led by the US and Brazil-that biofuels are a viable and desirable replacement for oil, to be fostered in international trade, but in a mostly unregulated global context where each country can pursue its agenda. There is a degree of purposive governance and collective issuemanagement led by major players in ad hoc venues-showing that biofuels should not be considered a case of non-governance. However, those fora have excluded a broader discussion that would have involved other actors and divergent interests. Moreover, this vacuum has given rise to attempts to govern biofuels unilaterally, as in EU sustainability criteria. This situation exposes the vulnerability of poorer producer countries, as they are compelled to adopt foreign rules that do not take their views and interests into account. SustainabilityThe bioeconomy has recently climbed up the global sustainable development agenda, yet there is no clear blueprint for its governance. International bioeconomy governance, in particular, remains very unclear and is seldom examined. Nevertheless, in an increasingly integrated world, there are obvious-and some not-so-obviousglobal implications to the large-scale diversion of agricultural land and commodities to other purposes. Biofuels demonstrated how, in the space of only a few years, a burgeoning sector quickly moved from being an inconspicuous market in a few countries to become one of the most contentious sustainability issues, often making it to the highest political level.Bioeconomy governance deserves far greater attention, and preferably before the fait accompli, i.e., while the bioeconomy still is in its formative stages. As the biofuels experience nevertheless offers a relevant precedent to go by, this chapter addresses

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“Unbundling” the biofuel promise: Querying the ability of liquid biofuels to deliver on socio-economic policy expectations

Cited by 44 publications

References 59 publications

Price responsiveness of supply and acreage in the EU vegetable oil markets: Policy implications

Price responsiveness of supply and acreage in the EU vegetable oil markets: Policy implications

Green industrial policies and domestic production of biofuels: an econometric analysis of OECD countries

International Bioeconomy Governance: Unveiling the Initial Patterns

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