A study of the land demands put in place by eco-friendly power sources has warned of a potential negative impact on the energy saving benefits of biofuels.
Biofuels can move energy generation away from unsustainable and environmentally unfriendly fossil fuel production.
However, the feedstock crops used in their production must be grown somewhere - with the report from the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) suggesting that this could lead to deforestation or other undesirable shifts in land use.
Calling this "indirect land use change" or ILUC, the institute warns that any net increase in greenhouse gas emissions could offset the energy saving advantages for which the biofuels are initially grown.
Lead author Catherine Bowyer says: "This analysis underlines the need to include ILUC in the EU criteria for assessing whether biofuels should count towards the delivery of the Renewable Energy Directive's targets."
While the IEEP itself is an independent research firm and consultancy, the study itself was commissioned by a number of organisations with interests in environmental action
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