{"id":461943,"date":"2026-06-05T06:41:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T06:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/461943\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T06:41:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T06:41:08","slug":"scramble-for-biofuel-as-oil-prices-rise-could-push-world-closer-to-food-crisis-biofuels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/461943\/","title":{"rendered":"Scramble for biofuel as oil prices rise \u2018could push world closer to food crisis\u2019 | Biofuels"},"content":{"rendered":"

Demand for biofuels is likely to leap by nearly a third this year, which could send food price inflation soaring further and push the world closer to a global food crisis<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More countries are opting to increase biofuel use as the price of oil has jumped to nearly $100 a barrel<\/a> after the US-Israeli attacks on Iran and the closure of the strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n

The US, Indonesia, Brazil<\/a>, Thailand and others have sought to increase the amount of biofuel \u2013 made from a wide variety of organic matter \u2013 blended with fossil fuels. Demand for biofuels could increase by 70% by 2030 if oil supplies remain constrained, the Transport & Environment (T&E) thinktank has estimated<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Fertiliser supply has also been constrained<\/a> by the war and prices have soared, leading to rises in the price of staple foods for some of the poorest people in many parts of the world. Experts have warned the world could already be heading for a food crisis<\/a>.<\/p>\n

K\u00e4di Ristkok, the energy and climate director at T&E, said biofuels would add to the pressure: \u201cGovernments are playing a dangerous game by promoting food for fuel,. Leaders are understandably trying to find solutions to the current oil crisis, but biofuels can never play more than a marginal role in our energy system without devastating consequences. The unintended impacts on food prices and the environment are enormous. Instead of feeding cars, governments must pursue more sustainable options like electrification.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biofuels compete with food crops<\/a> for land, while globally about one in every 20 tonnes of fertiliser is used to produce crops for fuel. In some countries it is a lot more: a tenth of fertiliser use in the US is for biofuels, and a fifth in Indonesia. \u201cThe more crops we burn, the more fertilisers we will need,\u201d said Ristkok.<\/p>\n

Biofuels, from oil-bearing crops and grains<\/a>, supply about 4% of the world\u2019s transport energy demand. If countries go ahead with plans to incease biofuel use that would rise to about 6%, according to T&E\u2019s estimates. Expanding biofuel production without competing with food crops for land and fertiliser would be difficult to achieve, according to the analysis, and reaching 20% of global road fuel coming from biofuels would require an area the size of South Africa.<\/p>\n

Though it is not possible to say how far the expansion of biofuels could lift food prices, Simon Suzan, the principal energy analyst at T&E, said it could be significant<\/a>. In the food crises of 2007-08, the UN\u2019s Food and Agriculture Organization estimated that biofuel use contributed between 40% and 70% of the increase in maize and soya bean prices.<\/p>\n

The US is already forecasting<\/a> that food prices will rise this year by between 2.2% and 4.7%, largely owing to the impacts of the war in Iran.<\/p>\n

Encouraging the switch to electric vehicles<\/a> could reduce demand for biofuels, said Suzan. Generating renewable energy is a far more efficient use of land than growing crops for fuel: solar panels covering just 3% of the land currently used for biofuel production would generate the same amount of energy, and because of the higher efficiency of electric vehicles, that would be enough to power a third of the global car fleet.<\/p>\n

Biofuels are also carbon intensive, producing about 16% more carbon dioxide than the fossil fuels they replace because of their impact on deforestation and changes to land use. Biofuels<\/a> produced from waste instead could provide some carbon savings. But Suzan said: \u201cTheir global use today is still very limited, and such residues are sometimes already used in other sectors.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Demand for biofuels is likely to leap by nearly a third this year, which could send food price…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":461944,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,219,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-461943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461943\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}