EBTP-SABS Draft Report on “Barriers to Biofuels in Europeâ€
Technologies for the conversion of biomass are evolving rapidly, and their deployment on commercial scale is crucial for triggering an advanced biofuels industry. But the implementation of commercial scale projects is slowed down by factors that are not only directly connected with the global crisis.
The EBTP-SABS consortium (European Biofuels Technology Platform - Support for Advanced Biofuels Stakeholders) carried out an assessment among representatives of different entities in EU and non-EU countries. The data summarized represent the stance and the outlook of stakeholders that look at the perspectives of the advanced biofuels industry from the point of view of governments and governmental agencies, of the Academia and of the business community.
The responses show that technological barriers are being removed, or significantly mitigated; at the same time, new obstacles are jeopardizing the deployment of advanced biofuels industries. Respondents indicate two main weaknesses:
1. A frail biomass market that needs to strengthen value chains in the context of a growing competition between end-uses and relevant variability of prices.
2. The uncertain framework where uncertainty of EU strategies and trends couple with inconsistencies at national level and, more generally, with the lack of coherent strategies and action plans.
