Davos, 25 January 2012

Bloomberg New Energy Finance launched its report “Moving towards a next-generation ethanol economy” at the World Economic Forum. Commissioned by Novozymes, the world leader in bio innovation and industrial enzymes, the report estimates the socioeconomic prospects of deploying advanced biofuels in eight of the highest agricultural-producing regions in the world, i.e. Argentina, Australia, Brazil, China, EU-27, India, Mexico and the USA.

“A huge global resource of agricultural residues can be harvested sustainably every year without altering current land use patterns and without interfering with the food chain," explains Steen Riisgaard, CEO of Novozymes.

"An estimated 17.5 percent of the agricultural residue produced could be available today as feedstock for advanced biofuels. With this amount, enough advanced biofuels could be produced to replace over 50 percent of the forecasted 2030 gasoline demand. The world has a unique opportunity to develop a next-generation bioproduct industry based on agricultural residues by 2030.”

The socioeconomic prospects of deploying advanced biofuels go well beyond energy security. The report shows that the eight regions analyzed have the potential to diversify farmers’ income, generate revenues ranging from $1 trillion to $4.4 trillion between today and 2050 and create millions of jobs.

For example, advanced biofuels could create up to 2.9 million jobs in China, 1.4 million jobs in the USA, and around 1 million in Brazil. The impact on climate change would also be reduced considering advanced biofuels emit 80 percent less greenhouse gas than ethanol.

“At a time when we're all striving to create jobs to secure our economic future as well as finding a sustainable way to produce energy, this study shows the benefits of a transition towards sustainable biofuels and bioproducts based on agricultural residues," says Steen Riisgaard. "It also strongly signals that policy incentives will result in great payback to society."

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