AEBIOM


INDUSTRY NEWS Bioenergy sustainability needs


pragmatism and effectiveness Material supplied by Harri Laurikka, Managing Director of The Bioenergy Association of Finland E-mail: harri.laurikka@bioenergia.fi


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ver the past few months, tense debates on the sustainability of biomass used for


energy production have arisen. Most stakeholders seem to agree on one point: an EU policy to ensure the sustainability of biomass is required. It is needed to secure investments, to set a level playing field among Member States and to provide answers to questions and concerns from society on future bioenergy developments. Bioenergy has played an important role as renewable energy consumption has significantly increased in the EU over the last 15 years. Currently, bioenergy is, in fact, the largest renewable energy source in Europe. In Finland, bioenergy


is the largest energy source and accounts for 26% of the total energy use and over 80 % of the renewable energy use. It comes as no surprise that the development of a new EU sustainability policy will have consequences on the future EU energy framework and on EU renewable energy and climate targets. This is why this issue should be carefully discussed and – in doing so – the whole spectrum of stakeholders should be involved. As a positive signal, almost 1,000 contributors participated in the public consultation recently


organised by the European Commission.


In the Paris climate conference last December, sustainability of bioenergy was hardly discussed. The focus of the conference was on how to organise the transition from fossil fuels towards a sustainable low emission economy. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had identified bioenergy as one of the key technologies to achieve ambitious emission targets cost-effectively in its assessment in 2014. The long- term vision of the Paris Agreement became a balance between carbon emissions and sinks post-2050. Bioenergy is a solution that fits very well into that vision, if used to replace fossil fuels and if carbon


stocks in forests keep increasing. For a long time, the IPCC has been clear on how to deal with emissions from biomass combustion: emissions should not be accounted under the energy sector, but under the so-called ‘Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry’ (LULUCF) sector in order to avoid double counting. This is a clear and established principle. In fact, the EU and many other countries have already stated at the UN Climate Convention that


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