Friday, 24 June 2011

US corn ethanol's eligibility from a WTO perspective

Below an interesting table from another ICTSD report (Sustainability Criteria in the EU Renewable Energy Directive-Consistent with WTO Rules?).

The last row provides an interesting view of US corn ethanol's eligibility from a WTO perspective:


AbbreviationType of biofuelOriginEmission savings fulfilled? (Theshold: 35%)Land-use criteria fulfilled?Eligible?
Rapeseed-1Rapeseed biodieselEUYesYesYes
Palmoil-1Palmoil biodieselMalaysiaYes (due to methane extraction)YesYes
Palmoil-2Palmoil biodieselMalaysiaNo (due to lack of no methane extraction)YesNo
Palmoil-3Palmoil biodieselIndonesiaYes (due to methane extraction)No (land was rainforest until 2009)No
Soybean-1 Soybean biodieselBrazilYes (low transport emissions because low-weight biodiesel is shipped, rather than bulky soybeans)YesYes
Soybean-2Soybean biodieselProcessed in EU with soybeans from BrazilNo (emissions are too high due to transport emissions of bulky soybeans)YesNo
Soybean-3Soybean biodieselBrazilYes (low transport emissions because low-weight biodiesel is shipped, rather than soybeans)No (land that is a designated protection area by the Fed. Govt. and producer cannot provide evidence that planning of soybeans did not interfere with protection purpose)No
Corn-1Corn-based ethanolEUYes (default value (49%) used with only applies to EU corn)YesYes
Corn-2Corn-based ethanolUSANo (calculation shows that GHG savings are only 34% and EU default value cannot be applied)YesNo


Source: http://ictsd.org/i/publications/86798/ (pp 10)

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