Biofuels backlash threatens the industry’s development

Dr Martin Tangney, director of the Biofuels Research Centre (BRC) at Napier University in Edinburgh, says that, “biofuels is beginning to suffer a backlash from people who just don’t believe in it. The problem is, they’re looking at first generation biofuels, not second generation, but it’s all lumped in together.”

He says that a key role of the BRC, which opened at the end of 2007, is to try and fill the information gap that leaves people thinking that biofuels are a risk to our future, rather than a means of securing it.

Frankenstein Food
Tangney continued, “we have a responsibility, and the media has a responsibility, to ask the right questions and try and make the distinction between first generation and second generation biofuels. The genetically-modified food industry disappeared almost overnight after the phrase ‘Frankenstein Food’ was coined by the British media. I think biofuels could suffer the same sort of backwards step, unless people can clearly distinguish between fuels that are made from completely sustainable resources, and fuels that are made from food or using land or resources that are competitive to food production.”

Getting the message across
“Apart from our research activities, we’re concerned about getting the right message across about second generation fuels. We’ve found there’s a big lack of information, not just for the public, but between government and industry and business agencies and research. There is nobody really joining those dots,” says Tangney.

Although government, industry, business and researchers are probably well aware of the differences between first and second generation biofuels, Tangney is right when he says it won’t harm to stress them.

More on this subject soon. In the meantime, don’t hesitate to voice your opinion here on MindsinMotion.net.

Related article:

8 May 2008 - Biofuels backlash - the world food crisis in perspective