Report recommends Biofuel Institute
17 Nov, 2008
10 Comments 
A report from the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE) says Australia should establish a national biofuels institute to improve collaboration between local biofuels researchers.
ATSE President and former Australian Chief Scientist Dr Robin Batterham said the country had an “impressive cadre” of biofuels researchers and that an institute resembling the Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute or the Australian Solar Institute (which is still being developed) would be an ideal model for developing sustainable collaborative international arrangements.
“Australia must enhance the knowledge base of its more promising biofuels resources and build on its significant existing strengths in biofuels research.” Dr Batterham said.
The ATSE report, Biofuels for Transport: a Roadmap for Development in Australia, will be launched in Melbourne today by Victorian Energy Minister Peter Batchelor.
CarAdvice are keen for your thoughts. Could biofuel research find the answer to our energy needs? Or is it only a small part of the solution? We look forward to your comments.
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November 17th, 2008 at 10:11 am
Biofuels are certainly a promising alternative to fossil fuels. I am all for encouraging research, but do we need an institute? Any new body would need to be productive rather than beaurocratic.
Biofuels appear to be a very attractive option for our country.
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November 17th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
In principal biofuels sound like a good idea, but in reality it just doesn’t work. Advocating biofuels is advocating higher food prices, as farmers will change their production from food crops to fuel crops. Look at places like Brazil, where biofuels receive huge subsidies from government. Not only have food prices gone through the roof, but huge swathes of rainforest are being cleared to grow crops for fuel.
The process of creating biofuels is very resource-intensive. The crops need water and fertiliser, machinery is needed to harvest them and the ethanol needs to be extracted. While millions starve around the world, we’re busy putting that food into our fuel tanks.
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November 17th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
Isn’t there a genetically enhanced bug that consumes sugar cane and excretes a type of oil?
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November 17th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
Toyota drivers?
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November 17th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
I think ethanol or biofuels are a good idea if only a stop gap. You are still burning fuel and creating CO emissions though and you’d need vast tracks of sustainable land and water resources to back it up. Neither of which we have much of here.
I think Honda are on the right track whereby using the non-food component of the plant to create the fuel. The only problem that appears from that is the plant is essentially eradicated from existence. So what happens to the nutrient of the waste plant matter that normally goes back into the soil for re-growth of future or other plant life. This won’t happen leading to another consumption imbalance similar to fossil fuels.
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November 17th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Yes certainly Australia needs to involved in this important issue on a global scale.
The food vs fuel argument has two sides to the story, and on that score Australia does very well - all ethanol based fuels are not equal.
Look up:
ethanolfacts . com . au/foodfuel
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November 17th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Biofuel is a dead end.
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November 17th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
Realcars,
That is a pretty broad statement (or opinion as the case may be) - care to elaborate. Do you mean Bio-deisel, ethanol or other? Should we just stuff brown coal in there and hope?
I tend to think that bio-fuels have a large role to play and are an important piece of the future energy jigsaw puzzle.
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November 17th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Bio fuel is the way forward, there is a gult of sugar on the world market, and we have a big industry in australia, everyone keeps talking green, it can be burnt in boilers for power generataton, make paper, wax, plastic, ethanol, none of the plant is left over and it makes a positive on the environment as we are using our sugar industry to help carbon gases,as its renewable product with little input, as well as it producing the most ethanol per acre or hectre out of any other food on planet, I cant see any negatives for australia.
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November 17th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
i’m pretty much for anything that keeps the fuel barons honest,but i can’t see its future.as a nation,we should be much more worried that the goverments water buying scheme is resulting in farmers simply selling their water to earn income,instead of actually GROWING something.with stuff like fertiliser and roundup skyrocketing,the worst drought in history,and really low end prices(try $200/ton wheat,oranges) you can’t blame them.the future of rural australia is at real risk of dying,and as the ageing farming community are leaving their farms(and water allocations)in droves,that one day soon we may ask “where can i get a freshly grown anything,let alone biofuel…
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