With the growing emissions in the transport sector and limited technological alternatives, EU policy-makers are increasingly looking at biofuels as a major solution to decarbonise its mobility sector and curb emissions, in particular in the aviation industry. Radostina Primova explains. As the emissions from the aviation are expected to grow by 70% by 2020 compared to the 2005 levels and by 300-700% by 2050 according to the forecast of the International Civil Aviation organization (ICAO), biofuels are expected to play a key role in decarbonisation scenarios of the transport sector. EU institutions are looking at biofuels as a substitute for the huge oil dependency in this sector, which strongly relies on liquid fuels. The EU 2020 climate and energy package requires EU Member States to include at least 10% renewable energy sources in the transport fuels consumed by 2010, which has led to a significant increase in the demand in land-based biofuels. The net imports of biodiesel and bioethanol in 2012 represented respectively 22, 6% and 29, 2% of the EU consumption in 2012 according to … Continue reading European Union biofuel policy needs a strong human rights dimension