Oil palm for biodiesel in Brazil — risks and opportunities
Journal article, 2015

Although mainly used for other purposes, and historically mainly established at the expense of tropical forests, oil palm can be the most land efficient feedstock for biodiesel. Large parts of Brazil are suitable for oil palm cultivation and a series of policy initiatives have recently been launched to promote oil palm production. These initiatives are however highly debated both in the parliament and in academia. Here we present results of a high resolution modelling study of opportunities and risks associated with oil palm production for biodiesel in Brazil, under different energy, policy, and infrastructure scenarios. Oil palm was found to be profitable on extensive areas, including areas under native vegetation where establishment would cause large land use change (LUC) emissions. However, some 40–60 Mha could support profitable biodiesel production corresponding to approximately 10% of the global diesel demand, without causing direct LUC emissions or impinging on protected areas. Pricing of LUC emissions could make oil palm production unprofitable on most lands where conversion would impact on native ecosystems and carbon stocks, if the carbon price is at the level $125/tC, or higher.

Land use

Brazil

GIS

Biodiesel

Oil palm

Author

Oskar Englund

Chalmers, Energy and Environment, Physical Resource Theory

Göran Berndes

Chalmers, Energy and Environment, Physical Resource Theory

Martin Persson

Chalmers, Energy and Environment, Physical Resource Theory

Gerd Sparovek

Chalmers, Energy and Environment, Physical Resource Theory

Environmental Research Letters

17489318 (ISSN) 17489326 (eISSN)

Vol. 10 4 044002- 044002

Driving Forces

Sustainable development

Areas of Advance

Transport

Energy

Subject Categories

Renewable Bioenergy Research

Other Earth and Related Environmental Sciences

Other Environmental Engineering

Energy Systems

DOI

10.1088/1748-9326/10/4/044002

More information

Created

10/7/2017