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Climate modification: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research study questions the ecological impact of rising imports of used 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 conserves carbon emissions by displacing fossil oil.

But such is the demand across Europe that imports now represent over half of the UCO that's made into fuel.

According to the study, external, there's no method to show these imports are sustainable.

With no testing of what's can be found in, professionals believe it is also ripe for fraud.

Used cooking oil imports might boost logging

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Reducing emissions from transport is proving to be among the hardest challenges for governments all over the world.

They've encouraged making use of biofuels as an important methods of curbing carbon from vehicles and trucks.

Biofuels are typically 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 means they cancel out the carbon given off when in engines.

Soy and palm oil were as soon as widely utilized as components of biodiesel but this practice has actually been widely rejected since it encourages deforestation.

So for the last years or so, using utilized cooking oil has actually broadened enormously as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have ended up being a key component of biodiesel with an efficient market emerging throughout Europe to gather and process the product.

But with the amount of biodiesel made from UCO increasing by around 40% every year because 2014, there simply isn't adequate chip fat to walk around.

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

Their study suggests this is extremely problematic when it concerns effect on the environment.

While UCO is thought about a waste product in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has long been utilized to feed animals. The report raises the concern of what people in these nations are replacing 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 nations aren't available however 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 gathered and exported to the UK and Ireland alone.

By comparison, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million people, managed to collect around five million litres of UCO in 2019.

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

"And they're simply purchasing more virgin oil which virgin oil is mainly palm oil, because that's the cheapest oil offered.

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

Another significant problem with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of demand from Europe, the rate of UCO is typically higher than palm oil. The worry is that some dishonest traders are simply watering down deliveries of UCO with palm.

As oils of various types are blended in bulk for transport, and no screening of the products is performed, some professionals think scams is rife.

The idea of fraud anywhere along the chain of supply is declined by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who say there are robust accreditation schemes in place.

"It is widely known that the European Commission has actually taken pertinent actions to entirely curb unsound market practices in biofuel markets," stated Angel Alberdi, EWABA's secretary general.

He states a brand-new database being developed by the EU will guarantee that trading, certification and sustainability data on all bio-liquids will need to be registered.

"The combination of revised accreditation plans and the pan-EU track and trace database will guarantee that no sustainability issues develop in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he informed BBC News.

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

The report from Transport & Environment points out that with shipping and aviation looking to decarbonise by using biofuels, need for UCO could double over the next years.

"Rising the need beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and risks of using 'phony' UCO, potentially causing indirect effects such as logging."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

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