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THE GOVERNMENT WILL raise fears that fraudulent imported biofuel could be passed off as sustainable fuel at a meeting of EU energy ministers next week.
Hundreds of millions of litres of biofuel are used in Ireland but there is a risk that some may not be what is claimed.
As reported by The Journal last month, a 24% increase in biofuel use in Ireland last year was largely met with an additional 54 million litres of fuel made from palm oil mill effluent (POME) – a waste product of palm oil production in Indonesia and Malaysia. This represented a 28-fold increase in POME use in Irish transport.
There are indications the amount of POME-derived biofuel sold into Europe last year may have exceeded the amount that could reasonably be expected to have been produced – raising fears that virgin palm oil may have been passed off as more sustainable, waste-based fuel.
Now Minister for Transport and Energy Eamon Ryan will raise fraud prevention at the EU Energy Council meeting in Luxembourg next week.
In a paper to be circulated at the meeting, the government says the EU may need to restrict the amount of POME that can be counted towards the bloc’s renewable energy targets.
The Irish paper states that comparing the amount of POME-based biofuel sold in the EU last year to the amount of POME that can be physically produced worldwide raises “cause for concern”.
The government goes on urge the European Commission to “take account of these concerns raised about POME and other palm oil derivatives” as it investigates potential biofuel fraud, and to take appropriate action on the issue.
The planned intervention marks a notable change in tone from the Department Transport; as recently as two weeks ago the Department said it had been assured as to the sustainability of current biofuel supplies to Ireland. At that stage it also expressed no concern about the sustainability of POME.
The amount of biofuel used in Ireland is increasing each year and this trend is set to continue, driven by government policy. The government mandates the blending of increasing amounts of biofuel into petrol and diesel, with a view to hitting carbon reduction and renewable energy targets.
Some vehicles run entirely on hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO), a biofuel product. Most HVO sold in Ireland last year was made from POME.
Palm oil production has caused deforestation and habitat destruction in Indonesia and Malaysia.
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The Green Scam Continues Unabated.
@087 bed: they cut down rain forest to plant palm trees. Sure crude oil is a biofuel too.
@P. V. Aglue: True, seeing as it is recycled dinosaurs, like all other fossil fuels, but the problem is that by digging it up and burning it, we are releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere that was originally releaed into it, and then sealed away millions of years ago, along with what is being released naturally by the planet now….so twice as much as should be there.
@087 bed: Except it’s by those chasing money not those trying to prevent calamity. It’s a familiar story you seem unfamiliar with.
@P. V. Aglue: Do you really think you make a valuable contribution to the national conversation or do you just say the first auld shyte that enters your head?
@Chutes: it’s more valuable than any of your’s
@Chutes: So much of the “green agenda” when investigated are people money grabbing.
Green Washing as it is called is done to so many bad projects, it is almost to be expected now.
Going all the way back to the infamous “Buy Diesel Vehicles” campaign.
Like Active Travel, everybody can walk 10 minutes or cycle 15 kilometers. Another falsehood but it is saying the planet, so it is good. Ban plastic straws, same thing. Great Big Campaign, impact extremly minimal in plastic usage but negative affects on people. Which was ignored. People are tired of being lectured at and after all of that. What they wanted is fake.
@Gary Kearney: I know. The planet doesn’t care about our opinions though. We act like we live on a different one, one that can support so many human beings. It’s a pity we don’t coz sadly this one seems pretty fkd now and it won’t be improving.
The ‘green agenda’ is ‘save as much as possible’ but it seems people prefer to barrel towards collapse than make themselves uncomfortable in the now.
@Chutes: Look up Ripley’s believe it or not….from some years back which states that the Population of the world could fit on the Isle of Wight. What’s the panic?
@Chutes: But it is not about making themselves uncomfortable now. It’s about being able to survive and catch what breaks you can. I know several families that do not know how they are going to heat their homes this winter. It’s a great idea to say retrofit our homes with solar panels and heat pumps and so on, but the simple fact is the grants are nothing compared to the full cost. I know some argue that these people can afford a foreign holiday but the families I speak of were on no form of holiday this year, foreign or otherwise, and one of them is making paper-logs from whatever they can get their hands on. And as for those who did get a break away, they used the couple of hundred they did manage to save to get that break instead of putting it towards something they can never afford
But the biggest fuel smuggling operation is the Greedy Greens . They introduced Biofuel and every-time I fill the tank to full it cost me E90 and it’s gone 3 to 4 days time as fuel gauge sweeps around to empty very quickly.
The only reason Bio fuel was introduced is raise the government coppers more with an uneconomical fuel.
Dear Electorate, get rid of the Greedy Greens at the General Election with their mad ideas.
@Tommy: Good man yourself Tommy… Drive better and maybe your fuel will last longer! As for the ‘Greedy Greens’ what are you on? You might disagree with everything about them but they make no money off of it.
Now if you read the articles you would have seen that we produce biofuels here. Do you prefer to give your money to the oil sheiks in Saudi Arabia?
But d’ya know, I’d say reading isn’t your strong point. Back to the Daily Mail site for you Tommy. Nice big pictures
@Dennis L: go away you are so green washed it’s freighting. I suppose you have all the public transport outside your door unlike anyone outside the pale…..
@Dennis L: they may not be making money from it, but we are still having to pay, in the form of carbon taxes and PSO levies and my personal annoyance, the introduction of the DRS, when there are perfectly good recycling collection services across the country, and while it is meant to be be a deposit scheme, still needs to be budgeted and then need to keep those items safe to get your deposit back. These are things that the Green Party introduced…more cost to the population and adding to the cost of living crisis. By the way, before you say the Greens did not introduce the carbon taxes, neither did they fight for their delay or suspension due to the cost of living crisis!
@Dennis L: Are you sure about that! Senior Green Party members owning shares in companies that profit from fuel.
How do you know Tommys skill as a driver. Maybe he has to drive long distances.
Careful getting down from the high horse of yours!
@Dennis L: they make no money off it?
lol. Did a little deeper pal.
Biofuels don’t save emissions relative to petrol or diesel once account is taken of the emissions from their production.
On top of this, because many biofuel raw materials compete for land with food crops, they make foodstuffs more expensive.
@lesidees: Certainly problems. That’s why the regulation is needed. There are algae based forms which don’t compete for arable land, hopefully they will gain traction and maybe even support jobs in areas of Ireland with land less suitable for crops (Connemara maybe?).
@lesidees: Also, poorer mileage return from the blended fuel. But thats good for the tax take.
@Dennis L: Talk about going out on a limb! You really are stretching on that post.
@Dennis L: there has been talk about algae and other sources of “second generation “ biofuels for the best of twenty years or more now, but afaik they are still nowhere near the commercial stage
It’s absolutely unconscionable to be using Palm Oil for fuel or even foodstuffs when the habitat of Orang Utans and other wildlife is basically being razed to the ground to service this vile industry
@Patricia Cautley: As I read your comment, I can’t help but think that we are to late! People who care are left howling into the void of those who don’t!
No matter what alternative fuel is produced & no matter how sustainable, the Greens will do away with it. The grand plan is that we stay in our homes & don’t travel, the only ones allowed to travel will be Eamon Ryan & Catherine Martin as they fly Business Class with their large entourages, from climate conference to climate conference. This is a party whose former leader Eamon Ryan advised us to buy Diesel Cars at one stage & who also promoted these Biofuels, the Greens are the biggest Hypocrites in the Green agenda. Get the Greens out now, ROG has destroyed the social fabric of our State, costing us Billions annually, while enriching certain connected individuals.
@SV3tN8M4: @John Mc Dermott: The Greens have no socio-economic plan so yes, the Greens are a thieving bunch but the scientific proof is there that we are creating a world that will become uninhabitable but it is the Green vote who should pay for it, the rich, the biggest polluters and yet unpunished while the ordinary person pays for it through catbon taxes that will make no difference, I mean the manufacture of cars takes innocent children to get the parts, what’s the difference between 19th century Europe and 21st Century Africa, a different continent that abuses children for profit of the wealthy.
@Brian D’Arcy: I keep trying to tell folks that the rich have their money. Immigrants have fk all, no point blaming them, you’ll get nothing there. The rich have all our money, we could do with some of it back around now before shit gets out of control.
@Chutes: ah yes, “it’s the rich fault” narrative from the guy who failed in life.
@Alex: I’m still alive. How is that a failure?
@Alex: First of all, while you are demonising emigrants, as opposed to refugees, you seem to be forgetting that many of them have a job before they even set foot in the country, due to being hired by Irish companies to do jobs that some Irish feel are below them, or the same job as the Irish for cheaper. Why not give out about the Irish companies that are looking for a cheaper workforce looking, as opposed to blaming said emmigrants soing what generations of Irish have done?
Secondly, concerning the genuine refugees, many do go looking for work as soon as they are allowed, in order to pay back the society that has taken them in.
Lastly, you badly need to learn some civility
@jak: Well, jak at least I’m not a racist nut job who spreads so much rubbish and incorrect information like yourself. By the way, I noticed you always seem to stand up for alex. By any chance, is it how you forget to change profiles before replying. Hmmn?
I just give up! What is the next dishonest practice for us to distrust, be careful of, watch out for, disregard.
@Patrice Ahern: Your government
@Patrice Ahern: All of them Patrice, they are all at it, all of the time. Yes we have better things to with our time than to spend them scrutinizing every product or service, but the tycoons exploit us because we don’t do the scrutiny. In our defense, we elect and pay a government to protect our interests but when they consistently fail to do so it leaves us, as a nation, exposed. It seems to me from shopping for weekly groceries that all the big retailers are working together to up the price instead of competing to reduce them. When a tin of big brand baked beans costs €3 and a box of big brand rice krispies is €6.50 something has gone wrong.
@Paddy Short: I agree that the price of things has gotten out of control, however, to say we have better things to do with our time is a lazy cop-out. A lot of people nowadays have no problem buying a load of cheap tat from China or spending hours on social media or plonked in front of their 70” tellys wanting the state to make all their decisions for them.
@Paddy Short: When parties get into government that have only one real agenda. We get what we have at the moment. The tail wagging the dog!
They might have a point, but maybe they should be more concerned about the diesel laundering on this very island?
For fk sake the money is there, thank you Apple. A semi-competent government would spend on the things we need instead of handing money back to us just to pay our bills.
Tackle the bills being so high instead, plan for future energy requirements and fix our sewage disposal systems, then housing, etc, etc.
@Chutes: It really can’t be as hard as they make it sound to decide where and how our money gets spent, ffs!!! How fkn hard can that be and they still make an arse out of it!
@Chutes: what planet are you on ? We’ve had, since ww2 ; the most prosperous society in human history.
All good things come to an end.
Greed is a part of human nature and as excessive as it seems right now, there’s nothing really new beneath the sun.
@offside again: Sorry, not sure what if anything ur trying to tell me here.
@Chutes: sorry about that. I can’t help you see.
@Chutes: if you like grunge : give ‘superheaven’ a listen.
There’s a concert ‘outbreakfest 2024′ on yt.
@Chutes: Have a look and research it. It is actually very complicated.
The problem is setting the priorities.
That is what happened this government. They got the priorities wrong. Wasting millions of Euros on pet projects.
@Gary Kearney: Anyone can set priorities. Not hard!
Long lost Celtic Tiger in your tank.
Maybe some smart lad from Kerry could could develop a plan to turn all the sewage that’s dumped into rivers and lakes into biofuel Be Gob lads that stuff would add some to your engine.
@Ned: the big sewer plants could possibly run a biomethane plant.
@Ned: Uisce Eireann says that the problem will be solved in twenty years or so.
Agriculture does not get similar understanding.
@JP: So because one problem is difficult we shouldn’t solve another different one?
@Chutes: The problem is certain people go after one area and the people involved to score Green points.
@Gary Kearney: No, it’s pollution!
My lawnmower won’t run on circle K petrol, wherever they get it, whatever dirt is mixed in with it.
I doubt car milage can be good with that petrol.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: What you have a ICE lawnmower, you are destroying the planet. Let it grow wild, like they are doing on the front lawn of Trinity College.
Looks terrible but they can be smug that they have saved the planet by not cutting the grass.
Bio alcohol production uses as much energy to produce as it provides-net zero gain. Also if you add alcohol to petrol it should raise the Octane value to 97 and higher which allows modern engine to produce more power from the same amount of fuel which makes the engine more efficient. Unfortunately the bio petrol we get still has the low Octane level of 95 which in engineering terms is crap so one can only conclude that fuel companies are using inferior petrol with the bio alcohol bringing the
octane level back up to a barely acceptable level. If we had 97 or higher Octane fuel we would get 10% more mileage for nothing .
More speculation
Stop baging our heads off of a brick wall and legalise cannabis, take the revenue away from criminal gangs and teach about the affects of cannibis, alcohol is far more dangerous but legal.
@Brian D’Arcy: and introduce more psychosis across the country?
@Mr “JonnieBoy” Johnson: You obvious know very little about legal cannabis. It does not cause psychosis as much as claimed. When it does it is usually the extremely strong hybrids, which have extremely high levels of THC and low levels of CBD.
CBD is the good stuff, THC is the bad.
Also the rest of the plant can be used for so many different brilliant purposes. Insulation, Hempcrete, rope, cloth and most importantly really soft toilet roll.
Dont throw a line out on a complicated subject.
@Gary Kearney: obvious you’ve had your fair share of the whacky baccy.
have your say