AGROFUELS in EU Member States

The National Renewable Energy Action Plans (NREAP) has been published⁽¹⁾.

As you know, 30 June 2010 was that deadline for Member States to submit their national renewable energy action plans required by the article 4 of the renewable energy Directive (2009/28/EC). But on July 07, UK and NL (+ DK, Fin, SW) are the only ones which had handed their plans to the EU executive, Spain  on 08 of July. See EC Website : http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/action_plan_en.htm These plans provide detailed roadmaps of how each Member State expects to reach its legally binding 2020 target for the share of renewable energy in their final energy consumption.

Civil society groups organised events in Brussels on the day by which EU member states had to submit their action plans: manifestation in front of the EU Council and a Round Table on EU Biofuels policy at the EP “Bioenergy – a carbon accounting time bomb” where scientists presented analysis showing the importance of taking into account ILUC factor in reducing GHG. The EC had not yet notified the documents that she had.

UNITED-KINGDOM:  Jatropha & Palm oil biofuels
Norman Baker (Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Regional and Local Transport), Transport; Lewes, Liberal Democrat) said: “Jatropha is not currently used in the UK and is not expected to be widely used in the future, as there are significant barriers towards its sustainable commercialisation” “The Department for Transport is currently reviewing the indirect sustainability impacts of a number of feedstocks, including palm oil. The results of this study will be published shortly.” For reminder: The RFA's 2008-09 report concluded that around 10% of UK biofuel reported under the RTFO last year came from palm oil and showed that only around 5% of the palm biodiesel supplied had sustainability certification. (Source: UK’s parliament: Written answers and statements, 5 July 2010 http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2010-07-05a.3710.h)
NREAP of UK: http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/doc/national_renewable_energy_action_plan_uk_en.pdf

NETHERLANDS: no comment http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/doc/national_renewable_energy_action_plan_netherlands_en.pdf

SPAIN: (Texto completo en español: ver abajo ‘7. Annexe’) : Forecasts: Energy consumption for transportation is one third of total consumption. The share of renewable energy for transport is expected to increase from 6% in 2010 to 13.6% in 2020. "Imports of biodiesel, which in 2010 would represent over 60% of domestic consumption should undergo a gradual decline in relative terms over the next few years until stabilizing at about 10% of total consumption in the second half of 2011-2020. " 'The consumption of bioethanol is expected to almost double (...) [but] the contribution of imports to national consumption of ethanol ETBE observed in 2010 will be reduced in subsequent years until it disappears. (Source : http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/doc/national_renewable_energy_action_plan_spain_es.pdf )

⁽¹⁾Article 4 of the renewable energy Directive (2009/28/EC) requires Member States to submit national renewable energy action plans by 30 June 2010.T hese plans provide detailed roadmaps of how each Member State expects to reach its legally binding 2020 target for the share of renewable energy in their final energy consumption.

EC Website : http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/action_plan_en.htm