Nippon Oil, Toyota and Petronas to develop palm-oil biodiesel
Today, members of the EU Parliament called for a ban on biodiesel made from palm oil (earlier post), because the crop is responsible for enormous environmental damage in South-East Asia and elsewhere. The recent mega forest fires in Malaysia and the resulting haze that clouded the skies over Singapore, are reminiscent of the situation in 1997-98 in Indonesia, when thousands of hectares of forest were burned down for palm oil. This recurring disaster releases vast amounts of CO2 and irreversibly destroys unique and extremely biodiverse ecosystems. The EU parliamentarians now think this should stop. Their call comes at a time when palm oil is being looked at more and more as a competitive feedstock for biofuels.
But on this very same day, Nippon Oil Corp., Toyota Motor Corp. and Malaysian state-oil firm Petronas announce that they are partnering on producing vast amounts of palm biodiesel for exports to Japan.
It is highly unlikely that the EU will be able to prevent other countries from using palm oil for biofuels - after all, 'energy security' and economics still get priority over environmental issues in many countries. Palm oil biodiesel is the most competitive biofuel of them all, currently still beating petro-diesel. But the EU Parliament's signal may finally open a thorough debate on the sustainability of this energy feedstock. The EU can use its political and economic power to force multilateral organisations, like the WTO or the UN, to play a much more active role in establishing basic and science-based sustainability criteria for energy crops (the existing and industry-driven 'Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil' is not nearly enough and its authority in this debate should be seriously questioned). This process must urgently start, before more rainforests - the value of which cannot be expressed in economic terms - are irreversibly destroyed.
The three Asian companies will start joint research in fiscal 2007, and begin test production in Malaysia in fiscal 2009 year, though. It will be the first major attempt in the world to convert massive amounts of palm oil on an industrial scale into automotive fuel, the sources say:
biodiesel :: biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: Malaysia :: Japan :: palm oil :: rainforests :: sustainability ::
If palm oil gains widespread acceptance in Japan as an alternative to petroleum, which is expensive, it would help diversify the nation's readily available fuel sources, as there would be a stable supply available from neighboring Asian countries.
Nippon Oil, Japan's largest petroleum company, is looking to gain the upper hand in the biofuel market by collaborating with Malaysia, the world's largest palm oil producer, and auto giant Toyota.
Using palm oil for fuel would also meet environmental concerns in theory because it would prompt the planting of more palm trees, which absorb carbon dioxide - so the logic goes.
(Note: in theory this is correct: as forests are burned down, they release CO2, but this gets taken up again by the growth of the new biomass. Since palm plantations take up more CO2 than pristine rainforests [with rainforests being net CO2 contributors], after several growth cycles, the released CO2 is taken out of the atmosphere and a neutral balance remains.
On the other hand, this simplistic pseudo-environmental argument is almost nonsensical, given the immense value of the biodiversity of Asia's rainforests. No economic argument whatsoever can be used as a legitimation for destroying this biodiversity. That much is clear. There is enough potential to produce liquid biofuels from crops that do not destroy biodiversity or rainforests, based on crops like sorghum, jatropha, or cassava, to name but a few.)
The project started to take shape after Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi asked Japan to collaborate with his country in exploring biofuel technology, when he met with then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in May.
But on this very same day, Nippon Oil Corp., Toyota Motor Corp. and Malaysian state-oil firm Petronas announce that they are partnering on producing vast amounts of palm biodiesel for exports to Japan.
It is highly unlikely that the EU will be able to prevent other countries from using palm oil for biofuels - after all, 'energy security' and economics still get priority over environmental issues in many countries. Palm oil biodiesel is the most competitive biofuel of them all, currently still beating petro-diesel. But the EU Parliament's signal may finally open a thorough debate on the sustainability of this energy feedstock. The EU can use its political and economic power to force multilateral organisations, like the WTO or the UN, to play a much more active role in establishing basic and science-based sustainability criteria for energy crops (the existing and industry-driven 'Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil' is not nearly enough and its authority in this debate should be seriously questioned). This process must urgently start, before more rainforests - the value of which cannot be expressed in economic terms - are irreversibly destroyed.
The three Asian companies will start joint research in fiscal 2007, and begin test production in Malaysia in fiscal 2009 year, though. It will be the first major attempt in the world to convert massive amounts of palm oil on an industrial scale into automotive fuel, the sources say:
biodiesel :: biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: Malaysia :: Japan :: palm oil :: rainforests :: sustainability ::
If palm oil gains widespread acceptance in Japan as an alternative to petroleum, which is expensive, it would help diversify the nation's readily available fuel sources, as there would be a stable supply available from neighboring Asian countries.
Nippon Oil, Japan's largest petroleum company, is looking to gain the upper hand in the biofuel market by collaborating with Malaysia, the world's largest palm oil producer, and auto giant Toyota.
Using palm oil for fuel would also meet environmental concerns in theory because it would prompt the planting of more palm trees, which absorb carbon dioxide - so the logic goes.
(Note: in theory this is correct: as forests are burned down, they release CO2, but this gets taken up again by the growth of the new biomass. Since palm plantations take up more CO2 than pristine rainforests [with rainforests being net CO2 contributors], after several growth cycles, the released CO2 is taken out of the atmosphere and a neutral balance remains.
On the other hand, this simplistic pseudo-environmental argument is almost nonsensical, given the immense value of the biodiversity of Asia's rainforests. No economic argument whatsoever can be used as a legitimation for destroying this biodiversity. That much is clear. There is enough potential to produce liquid biofuels from crops that do not destroy biodiversity or rainforests, based on crops like sorghum, jatropha, or cassava, to name but a few.)
The project started to take shape after Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi asked Japan to collaborate with his country in exploring biofuel technology, when he met with then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in May.
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