National Trust for Ireland says biofuel targets unsustainable

In Ireland, to meet binding EU transport targets, Ireland imported 126 million litres of biofuel in 2013 – some 84% of the total 150 million litres used last year. That’s according to An Taisce – The National Trust for Ireland, which is drawing attention to the failure of EU biofuels policy to meet one of its key aims, namely, to boost self-sufficiency in terms of transport fuels.

An Taisce says that reasonable progress has been made in Ireland to recover used cooking oil from restaurants and take-aways, with the total volume standing at 9.5 million litres in 2013. However, compared to the amount recovered domestically, Ireland is importing three times more used cooking oil from Spain, and one-and-a-half times more used cooking oil from the UK, and overall, imports of used cooking oil (UCO) outweigh domestically recovered UCO by 7 times.