New Zealand’s University of Victoria says bioeconomy key to achieving clean energy goals

In New Zealand, the University of Victoria says building a biorefinery—probably at Marsden Point—geared towards aviation fuel, as well as bioethanol and biodiesel for blending with conventional fuels will aid the transition away from the country’s current heavy transport and aviation vehicle fleet, as well as feeding current and future hybrid electric vehicles.

An aspect of the biofuels roadmap released in February is the better utilization of our distributed biomass, which could play a significant role in supplying industrial processes with energy, and biogas digesters (another key part of the roadmap) in our agriculture sector should be a no-brainer – for self-sufficiency, but also to (potentially) supply electricity to the grid.

The recent signing of a research and development agreement with Japan on hydrogen is also a step in the right direction for our transport industry, as long as it doesn’t mean we only export hydrogen to Japan.