Biofuels News

Girl in village in Madagascar. One of the world's poorest countries, it has been estimated that about 70 percent of Malagasy people suffer from malnutrition. Photo by: Rhett A. Butler.…

The palm oil industry has been lobbying Europe to allow palm oil-based biofuels to qualify as a low carbon fuel. But environmentalists say substantial amounts of palm oil production occurs…

Palm oil facility in Sumatra, Indonesia. The palm oil industry has hired lobbying powerhouse Holland & Knight to help overturn the Environmental Protection Agency’s finding that palm oil-based biodiesel fails…

Carbon remaining in storage 30 years after land clearance as a fraction of initial above-ground biomass. Courtesy of Earles et al 2012. Click image to enlarge. Carbon emissions from deforestation…

Deforestation for oil palm, which is used to produce palm oil, in Sumatra. PHoto by Rhett A. Butler Wilmar International, the world's largest palm oil processor and trader, has hired…

Clearing for soy in the Brazilian Amazon Surging demand for vegetable oil has emerged as an important driver of tropical deforestation over the past two decades and is threatening biodiversity,…

View Larger Map A campaign by NGO Nature Kenya has saved the Dakatcha Woodland Important Bird Area (IBA) from destruction for planting biofuel crops, reports BirdLife International. Located near Kenya's…

The world's top five oil companies—BP, Chevron, Conoco Phillips, Exxon Mobil, and Royal Dutch Shell—made a record $137 billion in 2011 beating out the previous record in 2008, reports Climate…

Greenhouse gas emissions from palm oil-based biodiesel are the highest among major biofuels when the effects of deforestation and peatlands degradation are considered, according to calculations by the European Commission.…

Oil palm plantations and rainforest in Malaysia The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ruled on Friday that palm oil-based biofuels will not meet the renewable fuels standard due to carbon…

Scientists have devised a new way to produce ethanol directly from seaweed, offering the potential to generate biofuels that don't compete with terrestrial food production and won't suck up scarce…

Intensive palm oil production is expanding at the expense of biolologically-rich lowland rainforests in the Peruvian Amazon, reports a study published in Environmental Research Letters. The research indicates that enthusiasm…

More than 40 million hectares of land has been acquired in developing countries for biofuel production in the past decade, reports a new study published by the International Land Coalition.…

Draining peatland in Indonesian Borneo. Photo by: Rhett A. Butler. It has long been known that biofuels release greenhouse gas emissions through land conversion like deforestation. But an innovative new…

Biofuels produced from oil palm plantations established on tropical peatlands are a substantial source of greenhouse gas emissions, reports a comprehensive new assessment conducted for the International Council on Clean…

Soy fields meet Amazon rainforest in Brazil. A new study argues that the destruction of rainforests for agriculture must stop. Photo by Rhett A. Butler. At the end of this…

Europe's biofuel push could exacerbate climate change unless policies are in place to accounts for emissions from indirect land use change, warns a letter signed by more than 100 scientists…

To encourage uptake of palm oil that is less damaging to the environment, the European Union (EU) should lift the import duty on palm oil certified under Roundtable on Sustainable…

Map of the Herakles/SGSO plantation in Cameroon. Courtesy of SAVE Wildlife Conservation Fund Industrial palm oil production is coming to Africa, its ancestral home. And like other places where expansion…

This article is a longer version of story that appeared at Yale e360: In Brazil, Palm Oil Plantations Could Help Preserve Amazon. For years now, environmentalists have become accustomed to…

This article is a longer version of story that appeared at Yale e360: In Brazil, Palm Oil Plantations Could Help Preserve Amazon. For years now, environmentalists have become accustomed to…

By the numbers: UK palm kernel and palm oil use A new study for the U.K. government found that in 2009 Britain imported at least 1.65 million metric tons of…

Converting cattle pasture and cropland in Brazil to sugar cane helps cool local climate reports research published in Nature Climate Change. Scientists with the Carnegie Institutions’s Department of Global Ecology…

According to a report by the US Pew Environment Group global clean energy investments, which do not include nuclear power, jumped 630% since 2004. The report detailing 2010 clean energy…

Not too long ago policy-makers, scientists, and environmentalists saw biofuels as a significant tool to provide sustainable energy to the world. However, as it became clear that biofuels were not…

Progress over the past 25 years in recognizing indigenous peoples' rights to land and resources has been interrupted by a worldwide commodity boom, argues a new report published by the…

Vale, a Brazilian mining giant, will buy palm oil producer Biopalma da Amazonia SA Reflorestamento Industria & Comercio, reports Bloomberg. The deal, valued at $173.5 million, will enable the mining…

This article—written in April 2010, updated in August 2010, and posted for the first time today—is part of larger "Fate of Forests" series. The commercial shows a typical office setting.…

Biofuels could meet up to half the world's current fuel consumption without affecting food production or forests, argues a study published last month in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.…

Program pembayaran karbon hutan seperti mekanisme pengurangan emisi dari penggundulan hutan dan degradasi (REDD) yang diajukan dapat memberikan tekanan pada teknik pertanian "ramah-alam liar" dengan meningkatkan kebutuhan untuk mengintensifkan produksi…