Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 4 • Number 19 • 21st October 2004

UK Stimulates Production of Biomass Fuel Crops

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The UK has established a task force to encourage the production of biomass, crops grown for use as environmentally friendly fuels. The government is also offering a range of grants to stimulate biomass supply and demand in an effort to help the UK meet its targets for using renewable energy and support the agriculture and forestry sectors.

Biomass takes several forms: forestry by-products, agricultural waste like straw and chicken litter, and fast-growing energy crops such as miscanthus, willow, poplar, sawdust, straw, and wood. Biomass is different from other forms of renewable energy in that it is controllable, unlike wind and wave power, and it can provide heat and electricity simultaneously. In addition, biomass would meet the government’s Renewables Obligation, which requires the UK to acquire 15 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2015. The overall EU target is to generate 12 percent of all energy from renewables by 2010. According to Food and Farming Minister Larry Whitty, “Biomass energy has the potential to be of huge benefit in terms of combating climate change, boosting farm diversification, and creating more rural jobs”. The latter points will likely gain in relevance as agriculture negotiations at the WTO proceed, leading to tighter criteria on currently large farming subsidies.

Despite the benefits of biomass, biomass has not developed as quickly in the UK as it has in other parts of Europe, according to Sir Tom Blundell, chair of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. Last May, in an effort to facilitate the development and use of biomass, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution published a report that claimed the government had ignored the potential for biomass, particularly as a means to combat climate change. The report said that biomass “is failing to develop under fractured and misdirected government policies”. While the government concurred with many of the findings in the report, a lot of work has yet to be done before biomass can become an alternative energy source and substantially influence the UK’s targets for renewable energies.

“UK Boost For Biomass Fuel Crops,” BBC, 15 October 2004; “UK ‘Lagging On Biomass Potential’,” BBC, 11 May 2004; “Biomass — Small Scale,” ENERGY SAVING TRUST, 2003.