The use of at least a small amount of plant-based biofuel in all transport fuels would become compulsory in Spain from 2009 under an energy law due to be approved by Congress this week. The European Commission has set a target of 5.75 percent biofuel use for 2010, but member states vary on how they choose to adopt it.

Spain looks set to approve compulsory biofuel use of 3.4 percent for 2009, rising to 5.75 percent of fuel energy value in 2010, according to the final text of a law on the Senate webpage. There also is a level of 1.9 percent for 2008, which the draft law says is indicative, not compulsory.

Governments are pushing biofuels as a means of reducing carbon emissions from fossil fuels as part of efforts to curb climate change, and also as a means of reducing their dependence on oil-producing nations. Spain's targets have been tacked on as an amendment to a hydrocarbons law that has been winding its way through the Congress and Senate for months and faces its final vote, back in Congress, this Thursday, a spokeswoman there said. Deputies cannot change the basic law at this stage but they can still tweak amendments, so the limits are still a step away from becoming set in stone.

As it stands, the amendment gives the government power to change the biofuel targets and raise the minimum levels. It has been added to the law, which adapts the rest of the hydrocarbon industry to EU regulations, after pressure from biofuel producers like Abengoa, Acciona and Sniace anxious to enlarge the market for their output.

Abengoa, the biggest ethanol producer so far, has temporarily closed one of its three plants because there was not enough demand in the national market and it became uneconomic to export. Although the dominant fuel distributor CLH says it is already widely blending biofuels, overall use last year was only 0.53 percent of total transport fuels.

Output from the four bioethanol and 12 biodiesel plants operational in 2006 was 446,000 tonnes, while the national market consumed only 242,000 tonnes. There are dozens more new plants either being built or on the drawing board and renewable energy lobby APPA has been pushing for a compulsory blending level of 4.25 percent from 2008 to boost the market.
(By Julia Hayley, PLanet Ark, 12/06/2007)