- The UK can produce its own domestic biomass for secure, affordable and low carbon energy but agricultural and energy policies need to be joined up
- The high value of bioenergy lies in its versatility to provide energy for a mix of low carbon heat, power, gas and liquid transport fuels
- Biomass combined with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) remains the only credible route to deliver negative emissions to help meet the UK’s 2050 climate change targets
The insight report “Enabling UK Biomass” looks at the challenges for scaling-up UK biomass production to complement imported biomass, it identifies potential future business models and the policy and market challenges that need to be overcome if the sector is to be built up.
The UK’s small size, dense population and limited forest cover creates some doubt that sufficient sustainable biomass can be grown domestically. Current land use and agricultural policy typically prioritises domestic food production, and it is often assumed that land is too scarce to allow significant planting of biomass for energy without undermining food production.
Therefore one of the real challenges is to join up agricultural and energy policies to support UK farmers to grow biomass and ensure there is a sustainable and secure source of biomass.
George Day, Head of Economic Strategy at the ETI and the report’s author said:
“Many future scenarios for the UK energy system suggest that bioenergy could play a crucial role in meeting our green house gas emission reduction targets by 2050, but there are important questions around whether the UK sector can rely predominantly on imported feedstocks or if there is a significant role for domestic production too.
“This report seeks to initiate a constructive dialogue amongst those who seek to influence, inform or make policy in this area. It sets out the case for a pro-active policy to incentivise development of a sustainable UK biomass production capability to complement imported biomass.
“At the ETI we believe there is a strong case for joining up agricultural, land use and energy policies in ways that support domestic biomass production, both to increase land use productivity and to enable us to meet carbon targets affordably.”
Bioenergy is particularly attractive because of its versatility - it can be turned into heat, used in power stations instead of fossil fuels and turned into gas fuels such as hydrogen which can be potentially used in vehicles in the future.
When biomass is used in conjunction with CCS it provides the only credible route to significantly reducing atmospheric carbon at a much lower cost and means the country does not have to work as hard to cut carbon in other areas such as transport where it is more difficult and expensive.
Growing biomass in the UK would increase energy security by complementing imports and provide economic value to the UK and could be a new income stream for farmers if the sector is developed properly.
George Day added:
“Our view is that the UK can produce its own domestic biomass for secure, affordable and low carbon energy and land could be made available without undermining food production, soil carbon stocks, local ecosystems or amenities.
“This will require strategic and long-term commitment to help the sector develop and establish itself.
“One of the real challenges at the moment is that agricultural and energy policies are not joined up. If the UK wants to develop its own domestic industry it needs to give support to its own growers of biomass and encourage them to adopt that .
“One of the most important things to consider is ensuring that growing biomass for energy does not undermine the amount of land available for food. ETI believes this can be done provided the policies are correctly shaped and give the right incentives to growers.”
The ETI’s latest insight into bioenergy follows one earlier this year that highlighted that bioenergy has the potential to help secure UK energy supplies, mitigate climate change, and create significant green growth opportunities if deployed effectively.
The “Enabling UK Biomass” insight report can be found at http://www.eti.co.uk/bioenergy-enabling-uk-biomass/
A link to the previous bioenergy Insight report, video and infographic can be found at www.eti.co.uk/bioenergy-insights-into-the-future-uk-bioenergy-sector-gained-using-the-etis-bioenergy-value-chain-model-bvcm/.