Government study reveals US will miss biofuel targets

The US is on track to miss its target of using 36bn gallons of biofuel a year by 2022, according to new research from the Department of Energy (DoE) presented at this week's climate change conference in Copenhagen.

The study was undertaken by the DoE's Office of Policy and International Affairs and was designed to assess the extent to which the target of consuming 36bn gallons of bioethanol equivalent a year by 2022, set out in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, could be met.

It found that while the global biofuel market will grow rapidly over the next two decades, more than doubling in size by 2020 to more than 50bn gallons and reaching 80bn gallons by 2030, the US would still fall short of its Renewable Fuel Standard target.

"We do not expect the target to be met," said Audrey Lee, a researcher working on the study, adding that while global supplies will increase, the expected rise of the price of oil means that many net exporters, such as Brazil and India, will choose to keep biofuels for themselves.

She also admitted that while the target will allow the US to bolster energy security by diversifying the range of countries from which it imports fuel, US agricultural constraints mean that it would not be able to achieve energy independence.

The research will come as a blow to president Obama, who has signalled that he would like to see the target raised, and will be seized upon by the US biofuel industry, which has been calling for increased support from government.

While predicting that the overall target will be missed, the study found that the impact of biofuels on food supplies will decrease as the emergence of second-generation fuels results in a decline in the proportion of the market taken up by grain-based ethanol.

Lee said that further moves to ensure biofuels deliver environmental benefits were in the pipeline, with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) working on measures to ensure biofuel imports from countries such as Brazil are sustainable.

She said that under the rules governing the Renewable Fuel Standard, biofuels made from biomass from Federal forests and environmentally protected land could not be counted towards the target. She added that the EPA was now looking at ways of ensuring such fuels are excluded, potentially through some form of certification scheme.