BIOENERGY FOR EUROPE: WHICH ONES FIT BEST?
BIOENERGY FOR EUROPE: WHICH ONES FIT BEST?
BIOENERGY FOR EUROPE: WHICH ONES FIT BEST?
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6 Conclusions and recommendations<br />
As explained in Chapter 2, in this project ten different biofuels were assessed and compared to equivalent<br />
fossil fuels with regard to their environmental impacts and nine of these were investigated for the<br />
whole European Union. Eight European countries participated in this study for which also different<br />
biofuels out of these ten were investigated.<br />
This chapter provides a brief summary of the main findings presented in this report and subsequently<br />
conclusions and recommendations will be given. In accordance with the goals of this study and<br />
the chosen methodology, the following issues will be addressed:<br />
• Results of the comparisons ”biofuels versus fossil fuels”<br />
• Results of the comparisons ”biofuels versus biofuels”<br />
• Results of the comparisons between the countries for each biofuel<br />
• Results of the socio-economic and political analyses<br />
• Conclusions and recommendations<br />
I Results of the comparisons "biofuels versus fossil fuels”<br />
The purpose of the comparisons between the various biofuels and their fossil counterparts investigated<br />
in this project was to show the environmental advantages and disadvantages of the different fuels in the<br />
various countries involved as well as the European Union. This was done by means of life cycle analyses<br />
(LCA). Several environmental impact categories were investigated for this purpose. It was found<br />
that for some of these no quantitative results could be obtained within this project that were reliable<br />
enough for a sound scientific assessment. This was partly due to the lack of sufficiently developed<br />
methodology and partly to the lack of available data, given the scope of this study.<br />
The following categories were assessed quantitatively and yielded results that can be regarded as very<br />
reliable:<br />
• Use of fossil fuels<br />
• Greenhouse effect<br />
• Acidification<br />
• Eutrophication<br />
• Summer smog<br />
In addition, the categories/parameters below were also assessed quantitatively but yielded much less<br />
reliable results.<br />
• Ozone depletion by nitrous oxide<br />
• Human toxicity<br />
• Ecotoxicity<br />
• Persistent toxicity<br />
• Ecosystem occupation<br />
• Harmful rainfall<br />
The net effect of nitrous oxide regarding ozone depletion is not ascertained as yet, as explained in<br />
Chapter 3.4.2. The results are included in the graphs but should be regarded with caution. The category<br />
human toxicity was also included in the result diagrams, but should be taken into consideration with<br />
care, as the data are of a lesser reliability than those for the categories in the first list above. The categories<br />
ecotoxicity and persistent toxicity were found to yield results too unreliable for further assessment.<br />
Finally, the category biodiversity and soil quality was investigated regarding four parameters, for two of<br />
which quantitative results were obtained which again however did not possess a satisfactory level of<br />
scientific reliability. It must be concluded that for the toxicity the lack of data concerning fossil fuels<br />
made the systems incomparable. For the biodiversity and soil quality categories further methodological<br />
developments are required before these can form a reliable part of a life cycle assessment.