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Both the EU and the USA have programmes to encourage the use of biofuels in gasoline and diesel. This is supposed to help reduce oil imports and help the environment at the same time.

But government subsidies and mandates have been criticised (see this from The Economist) and have even been accused of causing damaging distortions in world food prices.

Now, a new analysis of policy in the EU suggests they are both expensive and not even any good for helping the environment. This report in The Register summarises:

The craze for biofuels - a part of EU legislation for a decade now - is costing Europeans a fortune and isn't even environmentally friendly, a new report by renowned British think-tank Chatham House argues.

The original report is here as a pdf.

The Register suggests the consequences of biofuel mandates include:

...the poor starve, food prices are more volatile, and they don't contribute to greenhouse gas emission reductions...

The Economist concurs:

The ethanol mandate is clearly wasteful, does environmental damage, contributes to higher food prices at home and abroad through the misallocation of agricultural resources, and is a needless tax on everyone who drives in America. Time for it to go.

So the question is, are biofuels an expensive bad idea that don't even help the environment?

Update

Another calculation on the carbon neutrality of biofuels has been released. The original paper is here. It concludes they are not as carbon neutral as thought.

A news story on Gizmodo, headlined "Biofuels Worse for Global Warming Than Petrol", reports the new study but also notes that it is controversial:

The Renewable Fuels Association obviously thinks this stinks as much as a trillion Argentinian cow farts, with RFA's Geoff Cooper saying: "He has been making these arguments for years, and for years they have been rejected by climate scientists, regulatory bodies and governments around the world, and reputable life-cycle analysis experts. Just like Professor DeCicco’s last study, this work was funded by the American Petroleum Institute, which obviously has a vested interest in obscuring and confusing accepted bioenergy carbon accounting practices."

So they disagree and choose an ad hominem attack rather than pointing out where the calculations are wrong. This leaves the question of whether the calculations are any good open to skeptical analysis.

Clarification

Some comments have suggested that the question is too broad. I disagree but for the sake of argument let us agree that we should judge the question of environmental friendliness purely in terms of the effect on CO2 production.

By the metric of carbon mitigation, are the major biofuels used in transport fuel environmentally friendly compared to the fossil fuels they replace?

matt_black
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    I think "biofuels" is too broad to answer since different biofuels have very different levels of energy efficiency. Many sources say that grain derived Ethanol is not a "green" fuel and may even consume more energy than it produces. There are other ethanol biofuels - like Brazil's sugarcane derived ethanol that may be better. And there are lots of other alternatives like biofuels derived from cooking waste oil, high lipid algae, cellulose derived ethanol that may be more efficient. – Johnny Apr 17 '13 at 21:07
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    and define "help the environment"... Is cutting down a million acres of old growth forest to grown corn that can get turned into "biodiesel" so cars MIGHT emit a few ppm less CO2 "good for the environment"? – jwenting Apr 18 '13 at 06:54
  • 1) rising (wholesale) food prices isn't necessarily bad thing given, that until now they have been so low, that more than half of EU budget are agricultural subsidies. 2) unlike oil, biofuels are made from biomass, which first captures CO₂, which then is released. Which makes it pretty close to CO₂ neutral. Besides, not even solar power is CO₂ neutral. – vartec Apr 18 '13 at 09:30
  • btw. it seems that there are two ideas confused here, one is: "biofuels don't help the environment", while other is "biofuels aren't the alternative, which helps the environment most". AFAIK, no one claims, that biofuels are more environment friendly than fossil fuels. – vartec Apr 18 '13 at 09:54
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    @vartec: There are lots of claims that biofuels are better than oil. Just ask the National Corn Growers Association and they'll give you lots of reasons why Corn derived Ethanol is better than fossil fuels for the environment: http://www.ncga.com/news-and-resources/news-stories/article/2012/09/our-view-ethanol-wins – Johnny Apr 18 '13 at 17:30
  • @Johnny I don't agree question is too broad as good answers would include information on which biofuels are green in which circumstances. – matt_black Apr 18 '13 at 18:38
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    From the FAQ: "Your questions should be reasonably scoped. If you can imagine an entire book that answers your question, you’re asking too much." A general question that encompasses all biofuels is very broadly scoped. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of current and experimental biofuels. – Johnny Apr 18 '13 at 18:42
  • @Johnny You are exaggerating. There are only a handful that currently matter. I think a good answer would cover a handful (not every possible experimental thing). My question at least *implies* ones currently widely used, which somewhat limits the scope. – matt_black Apr 18 '13 at 21:18
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    @matt_black: Here's a partial list of *current* Biofuel sources: Bioethanol (fermented corn, sugarcane, etc), PPO (pure plant oil), Biodiesel, Biogas (i.e methane from anerobic decay), Cellulose derived ethanol, Biomass-to-Diesel, Biomethanol, Biobutane, Biomass to oil, Biomass to hydrogen, Dimethyl Ether (organic compound similar to diesel), Synthetic Natural gas from biomass. Rather than *imply* one current widely used biofuel, why not *explicitly* list it, then the scope is much more reasonable and more easily answered. – Johnny Apr 18 '13 at 21:26
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    @Johnny: my bad, I've dropped "not" in that sentence, it should have read: no one claims, that biofuels are not more environment friendly than fossil fuels. – vartec Apr 19 '13 at 08:34
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    @vartec: Well...that's not true either - there are claims that corn derived ethanol uses more energy in its production that it yields as a fuel. Which brings me back to my original question that the question should be narrowed down from "biofuels" to be more specific since some are better than others. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/03/050329132436.htm – Johnny Apr 19 '13 at 14:48
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    This remains far too broad. Please narrow it down to a single, specific, notable claim. There are whole books written about the claims you've asked about here. – 410 gone Aug 29 '16 at 12:31
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    "*let us agree that we should judge the question of environmental friendliness purely in terms of the effect on CO2 production*" - is that limitation warranted? Is that how experts assess this claim? –  Aug 29 '16 at 17:20
  • Can you make clear what the notable claim is? You've quoted several source, each saying a different thing, none matching the title. What is the notable claim that you want us to find evidence on? –  Aug 29 '16 at 17:21
  • @dawn the notable claim is that biofuels are not, as is widely claimed, more environmentally friendly than fossil fuels. More specifically, the biofuels that get government subsidies for transport fuels (so mainly bioethanol and biodiesel) do not reduce net carbon dioxide emissions. We could judge other fuels (but the ones specified in the original question are the big actual ones in use) and we could judge on broader metrics of environmental friendliness (but this seems to be considered too broad). – matt_black Aug 29 '16 at 18:12
  • @matt_black To be clear, is the claim simply "biofuels are not more environmentally friendly than fossil fuels". Or is the claim "Biofuels that get goverment subsidies for use as transport fuels do not reduce net carbon dioxide emissions"? You say the first is notable. Is the second also notable? If both are, which is this question about? Regardless of which is the notable claim, what's with all the other text and quotes in the question? –  Aug 29 '16 at 19:30
  • @dawn The original claim was that biofuels are not more environmentally friendly than fossil fuels. The question was edited as this was thought to be too broad. The second claim you mention is not a *different* claim but simply a more specific version of the first claim. The quotes reflect actual claims made in reputable media sources. – matt_black Aug 29 '16 at 19:59
  • @matt_black So, what notable claim is this question about *right now*. The second claim (that *you* mention) is restricted to "biofuels that get government subsidies". The first claim "biofuels are not more environmentally friendly..." doesn't have that limitation. They're different claims. And each of the quotes is also different. Do you want to ask about one of those quotes? Or one of your paraphrases? Regardless, which notable claim is this question about *right now*? –  Aug 29 '16 at 20:34
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    If you're serious about it only being about GHG emissions, then please remove all the other clutter from the question, because as it stands, you're still asking about several different claims at the same time – 410 gone Aug 30 '16 at 06:43

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