Synfuels: the next miracle cure for sustainable mobility? | European Union Energy

In Short:

Leading European car manufacturers and fuel supply companies have launched a new alliance to promote the use of synthetic fuels for transport.

RELATED

Alternative fuels for transport
Green cars
Biofuels for transport
Background:

Synthetic fuels or synfuels are a new generation of transport fuels produced from synthesis gas obtained from natural gas, coal or biomass. The synthetic gas is transformed into the liquid fuel via a special process called the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. The most interesting developments are Gas-to-Liquids (GtL), Coal-to-Liquids (CtL) and Biomass-to-Liquids (BtL). These new fuels produce less sulphur emissions and are therefore interesting for the environment. Contrary to LPG (liquid petroleum gas) and CNG (compressed natural gas), they do not need any change of engines or fuelling infrastructure.

With rising oil prices and the looming demand-supply problems related to oil, the transport sector is increasingly looking for alternative fuels to keep our ever-growing car park going. Transport has another challenge as it is the fastest growing source of greenhouse gas emissions that cause global climate change.

Issues:

Three car makers (DaimlerChrysler, Renault and Volkswagen) and two fuel producers (Sasol Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell) are the founding members of the newly formed Alliance for Synthetic Fuels in Europe (ASFE).

At the launch event, Rob Routs, executive director of Shell, expressed his confidence in the market potential of synfuels, especially Gas-to-Liquids, which is already at an advanced stage of development. Although most GtL production facilities are still in the Middle East (Qatar) and South Africa, Europe could see new large-scale plants in the next years (one is planned in Freiburg, Germany for 2007). Mr Routs saw the synthetic fuels playing a major role as "bridges to the new low-carbon renewable fuels" (fuel cells, hydrogen).

Daimler Chrysler's Thomas Weber urged European politicians to set the appropriate conditions for the development of synfuels (fiscal and financial support, integrated approach for CO2 reductions for cars, and more R&D money for alternative fuels research).

GtL and other synthetic fuels face several challenges:

cost-effectiveness: these fuels are still more expensive than the conventional gasoline or diesel;
greenhouse gas emissions: GtL emissions are nearly similar to GHG emissions from conventional fuels and the more interesting Biomass-to-Liquids (BtL) is not commercially ready;
Europe's energy dependency: as most production facilities are currently outside Europe, this would not immediately solve the problem of being dependent on "unstable" and non-domestic regions;
overall energy competition: according to some experts, large-scale GtL development could start to compete with LNG production for power use and this could lead to more use of fossil fuel installations for power (coal); this argument was countered by the speakers of the event: "we have enough gas around to satisfy all these needs".
Positions:

Commission Vice-President Verheugen welcomed the arrival of the new sunfuels alliance and expressed his support. He sketched the opportunities and challenges Europe faces with globalisation and said that only innovation and more R&D would help Europe adapt to the changing world. "We have to be better than the rest of the world", Mr Verheugen said. As to security of energy supply, Europe needs to take the lead in the "world energy revolution," according to the Vice-President, who referred to the new Commission Green Paper on Energy.

He outlined further the policy principles on the basis of which policy makers have to make decisions when deciding on support for alternative fuels. "We can not sign a blank check for alternative fuels," Mr Verheugen stated. He also pointed to the extra potential of BtL to reduce greenhouse gases in a more substantial way than GtL.

Austrian agriculture and environment minister Josef Pröll expressed satisfaction with the new alliance in the name of the EU Presidency. He underlined in particular that "Europe needs the cleanest and safest vehicles."

In the following panel discussion, DG Environment Director Jos Delbeke also indicated that the Commission favours BtL because of its climate change benefits. He warned that European solutions of using tax differentiations (having less tax for certain fuels than for others) are difficult to achieve because of the unanimity rule in Council voting on these issues, but left open the possibility to use environmental arguments to make the case for favourable tax policies for alternative fuels.

Hungarian Socialist MEP Edit Herczog, although supportive of synfuels, drew attention to the issue of the actual cost to consumers of these new fuels ("PtT, purse-to-tank", she called it, referring to the Brussels practice of using acronyms). She also said that if synfuels are to succeed there is a need for a "broad awareness campaign" of what these fuels are. "When I talk to fellow MEPS", she said, "they did not know what I was talking about."

Last but not least, Energy Commissioner Piebalgs presented the main ideas of the new energy green paper. He acknowledged the role synthetic fuels can play and singled out Biomass-to-Liquid for its environmental and climate change benefits. "In particular we believe that the rapid construction of commercial-scale plants for the production of Biomass-To-Liquid fuels will be very important", Piebalgs said.




Links


EU official documents


Eur-Lex: Communication "An EU Strategy for Biofuels" , COM(2006) 34 final (Febr. 2006) [FR] [DE]

Eur-Lex: Communication "Communication on alternative fuels for road transportation and on a set of measures to promote the use of biofuels" , COM(2001) 547 final (Nov. 2001) [FR] [DE]

Commission: Speech Vice-President Verheugen "Synthetic fuels for a more competitive and environmentally friendly Europe" , (conference on synfuels, 7 March 2006)

Commission: Speech Commissioner Piebalgs "Secure Energy Supplies for the Future" , (conference on synfuels, 7 March 2006)

EU Actors positions


Volkswagen AG: Sunfuel - the way to sustainable mobility

Related DocumentsBiofuels debate divides EU farm ministers (22 February 2006)EU tackles climate change via R&D (02 December 2005)Commission to take action on alternative fuels (07 October 2005)Alternative fuels need more backing from EU states, says panel (20 January 2005)EU funds fuel cell research for clean transport (21 September 2002)

Synfuels: the next miracle cure for sustainable mobility?
ToolsSystran rough translation
Synfuels: the next miracle cure for sustainable mobility? (Euractiv.com)
Add this page to FavoritesE-mail to a friend