Interaction of National Policy Fields for the Mobilization of Biomass Value Chains

Abstract

So far policy conditions have been extremely important for the deployment of biofuels and bioenergy. Different EU-wide and national/regional policies are playing a role in the mobilization, supply, conversion and end-use of biomass for energy as well as other purposes. To develop a robust bio-based economy, it will require both the access to renewable feedstock in sufficient quantities, of guaranteed quality and at a competitive price and stimulating the market demand, without disrupting food supply and other markets. However, policies have been focusing on separate fields next to each other, e.g. dedicated policy for biofuels and a policy framework for electricity, sometimes combined with CHP promotion where heat is also involved. Policies have hardly been integrated for the energy fields, and conflicts with other policy areas have risen. Policy areas like agriculture, forestry, waste, environment, climate, trade, procurement, enterprise, and innovation have their own goals and targets, which are not necessarily compatible with maximised deployment of renewable energy, and biomass in particular. Some of the issues are biodiversity protection, soil carbon stocks, air quality, subsidy induced competition with other sectors, and tax levels. EU Member States tried to embed some of these issues in energy policies, but all followed their own approach (see e.g. policies in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, UK, and Poland) in terms of restrictions of scale, limitations to specific types of biomass eligible for support, protection of existing biomass based sectors, and specific sustainability criteria. Common criteria are only followed in terms of environmental sustainability of biofuels for transport and bioliquids for stationary bioenergy, as imposed by the Renewable Energy Directive. While there are considerable biomass potentials in the EU Member States, it will be important to implement balanced and integrated policies, taking into account different policy fields, aiming for a sustainable and resource efficient mobilization and use of these biomass resources, while keeping a level-playing field with other markets (i.e. avoiding market distortions through subsidies to one application). Within the European sister projects Biomass Policies (IEE, www.biomasspolicies.eu) and S2Biom (FP7, www.s2biom.eu) different steps are taken to provide guidelines for these integrated policy frameworks. Starting point is the mapping (at EU and MS level) of what regulations and financing mechanisms already exists in the field of energy, agriculture, environment, economy, etc., with relevance to important biomass value chains. Putting the approaches of different countries next to each other we will benchmark the different approaches for good practices and then feed into policy recommendations. This paper will highlight national policy profiles for a number of representative countries in the EU, showing the interaction between different policy fields, and will present first results of the benchmarking: which country approaches can be set as an example and what are the main lessons for future policy frameworks.