Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether his Department has plans to amend the definition of non-road mobile machinery in the Energy Act 2004 to limit the eligibility of biofuel suppliers that claim Renewable Transport Fuel Certificates on biofuel supplied to diesel powered generating sets for the purpose of increasing the availability of renewable fuels for use by the UK aviation sector.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
Under the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) renewable fuel used in mobile generators is eligible for Renewable Transport Fuel Certificates (RTFCs). Suppliers of fossil fuel used in mobile generators and other forms of non-road mobile machinery are also subject to an obligation to ensure renewable fuels are supplied in the UK. Suppliers of fossil fuels used in aviation are not currently obligated under the RTFO, but renewable fuels used in the sector are potentially eligible for RTFCs. The Department has no plans to limit the supply of renewable fuel to mobile generators for the purposes of increasing the availability of renewable fuels in the aviation sector.
In July the Department launched a consultation on proposals for a UK sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) mandate requiring jet fuel suppliers to blend an increasing proportion of SAF into aviation fuel from 2025. The consultation closes on 19 September. The modelling supporting the consultation has taken into consideration the interactions between fuels needed for road, non-road mobile machinery and aviation, and the availability of sustainable feedstocks and renewable fuels. A summary of responses including next steps will be published in due course and the modelling will be updated considering evidence from the consultation.
Policy development on the RTFO takes into account competing demands for renewable fuel resources across different transport sectors. It is also informed by regular reviews to ensure the scheme is delivering cost effective carbon savings in support of UK carbon budgets. It is widely understood that the availability of biomass used to produce biofuels is limited. So, these finite resources need to be deployed in sectors of the economy where greater greenhouse gas savings can be achieved, or sectors that have fewer decarbonisation options, such as aviation. The renewable fuel market will transform and adjust through this decade and beyond. As we transition to electric vehicles, some biomass and other sources of renewable fuel will be freed up to accommodate increased use in SAF.
Biofuels are traded in a competitive global market and the RTFO certificate trading scheme includes several measures to ensure costs passed on to the consumer are minimised and targets for the supply of renewable fuels are met. For example, the RTFO scheme includes a buy-out mechanism. The buy-out price, which was reviewed and updated last year, is set at a level which ensures that in normal market conditions there is a strong commercial incentive for suppliers to discharge their obligation through the supply of renewable fuels. Suppliers of fossil fuels to the non-road mobile machinery and diesel road vehicle sectors therefore have a strong incentive to meet their obligations under the RTFO through ensuring the supply of renewable fuels.
There are no direct benefits to the UK public of improved air quality in international airspace, defined as airspace which is outside of the standard state territorial limits. Studies have shown that NOx emissions from aircraft above 1,000 feet are unlikely to have a significant impact on local air quality. However, on top of the carbon emissions reductions and economic benefits associated with SAF use and production, there is growing evidence that SAF also reduces sulphur dioxide and particulate matter emissions. Thereby improving local air quality during take-off and landing, as well as other non-CO2 impacts of aeroplanes, including contrails.
Asked by: Ben Lake (Plaid Cymru - Ceredigion Preseli)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent studies his Department has undertaken on green alternatives to liquefied petroleum gas.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The Government is committed to reaching net zero emissions by 2050 and, as part of the work to meet that commitment, has taken great strides to promote green alternatives to liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and other fossil fuels in a range of sectors. This has included gathering evidence on a number of different potential technologies including electrification, hydrogen and biofuels.
For the transport sector, the Government has not undertaken any recent studies into the alternatives to LPG specifically. Our recent Transport Decarbonisation Plan set out how we plan to cut emissions in the transport sector. This includes the phase-out of the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030, and, from 2035, the requirement for all new cars and vans to be 100% zero emission at the tailpipe. Renewable alternatives to LPG, including for example bio-LPG, are supported through the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation, which has been in place since 2008. In regard to hydrogen as an alternative, the Government has recently published the first ever UK Hydrogen Strategy, which builds on the Government’s ambition for 5GW low carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030.
On heating in particular, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy commissioned research into the alternatives to using fossil fuels for heating off the gas grid. These can be found here and include Electric and bioenergy heating in off-gas grid homes: evidence gathering & Electric heating in rural off-gas grid dwellings: technical feasibility.
Asked by: Imran Ahmad Khan (Independent - Wakefield)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to increase the proportion of road freight journeys made in vehicles powered by renewable energy.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
Decarbonisation of the UK’s road freight sector will play a critical role in delivering on our climate ambitions. The Government is rewarding the supply of renewable fuels for use in road transport, including heavy goods vehicles (HGVs), through the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation scheme. We have also made funding available through multimillion-pound industry demonstration competitions, such as the Future Fuels for Flight and Freight Competition (the F4C), which support projects capable of producing low carbon waste-based fuels for use in aviation and HGVs.
The Prime Minister’s Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution announced that we are investing £20m this financial year in planning for zero emission road freight trials which will support UK industry to develop cost-effective, zero-emission HGVs and their refueling infrastructure in the UK. These trials will advance research and development in the technologies of catenary electric, battery electric and renewable hydrogen-powered HGVs, allowing us to begin the commercial roll-out of the appropriate new technologies before the end of the decade.
We will also be consulting on a date for phasing out the sale of new diesel HGVs to drive innovation and development and increase the uptake of zero emission alternatives within the HGV sector.
In November 2020, HM Treasury published the National Infrastructure Strategy. This confirmed that the £950m Rapid Charging Fund (RCF) was to be made available to future-proof electrical grid capacity at service areas on motorways and major A-roads. Whilst the RCF is currently targeting cars and vans, the additional electrical capacity will support charging infrastructure for zero emission HGVs. We are currently analysing the demand from zero-emission HGVs at Motorway Service Stations and considering how the infrastructure installed as part of the RCF can be used by zero emission HGVs in the future.
Asked by: Philip Dunne (Conservative - Ludlow)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of removing duty for (a) hydrotreated vegetable oil and (b) other renewable liquid fuels for home heating purposes.
Answered by Kemi Badenoch - Leader of HM Official Opposition
Hydrotreated vegetable oil is a direct substitute for diesel and it is therefore taxed at the rebated rate for diesel when it is used for home heating. There are no duty incentives for renewable fuels used as a direct substitute for diesel, and it would be difficult to legislate for a complex scale of duty rates to be applied to different hydrocarbon oil products. The Government will keep this under review to determine whether there is a case to make changes to the taxation of this fuel.
The UK is the first major economy in the world to legislate for net zero emissions by 2050 and the Government’s Renewable Heat Incentive, currently worth over £1 billion per year, supports households to install renewable heating systems such as heat pumps and biomass boilers. The forthcoming Heat and Building Strategy will set out the Government’s position on the transition to low carbon off gas-grid heating, but fiscal decisions are a matter for Budgets.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether he has made representations to HS2 Ltd to support measures to encourage HS2 Ltd's contractors to use 100 per cent renewable diesel to improve air quality on and near those constructions sites.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
Air quality requirements for HS2 are set during the parliamentary stages of the Bills for each phase of the railway. These reflect any relevant legal requirements or wider strategic governmental goals, and build on the air quality impact assessments and conclusions reported in the relevant Environmental Statements.
Measures to mitigate air quality effects on Phase One of HS2 are set out in Chapter 7 of the Code of Construction Practice, and in Information Paper E31 (air quality). These measures include emission standards and targets for all Heavy Goods Vehicles and Light Duty Vehicles used in construction, plus best practice measures to control construction site dust.
Within that framework, actual decisions on fuel purchases for construction sites and vehicles, are taken by contractors rather than HS2 Ltd. HS2 Ltd is, however, running an innovation project to test a range of biofuels. The findings of this project will help establish the benefits provided by such fuels, and in due course be used to inform contractors’ decisions.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of introducing a lower excise duty bracket for biodiesel that is 100 per cent derived from waste biomass.
Answered by Kemi Badenoch - Leader of HM Official Opposition
The Government supports renewable fuels under the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO), rather than through duty relief. One benefit of this is that the RTFO scheme sets mandatory sustainability criteria which must be met in order for renewable fuels to benefit from the receipt of Renewable Transport Fuel Certificates (RTFCs). In this way we can ensure that renewable fuels supplied and rewarded in the UK deliver genuine reductions in greenhouse gas emissions compared to fossil fuels.
Where a renewable fuel is produced from waste it is eligible to receive twice the reward in certificates under the RTFO scheme than biofuels produced from non-wastes.
The RTFO has been highly successful in supporting a market for renewable fuel since its introduction in 2008. In 2019, the use of renewable fuels supplied under the RTFO scheme, as a replacement for fossil fuels such as regular petrol or diesel, saved almost 5.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. This is the equivalent of taking 2.5 million combustion engine-powered cars off the road. Renewable fuel supplied under the RTFO currently contributes around a third of the savings required for the UK’s transport carbon budget and around two thirds of biofuels reported under the RTFO are made from wastes.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of classifying biodiesel that is 100 per cent derived from waste biomass separately from biodiesel made from non-waste biomass.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Department recognises the benefits that fuels produced from waste can have in reducing carbon emissions. It is anticipated the merits of any new classification for biodiesel proposed would relate to better informing the public or incentivising the uptake of waste derived biodiesel.
The industry standard for diesel and UK regulations make no requirement in respect of the labelling by feedstock type of biodiesel blended into diesel and placed on sale in UK forecourts. There is little merit in introducing such a requirement and given the complexity of fuel supply chains it is likely this information will not always be known at the point of sale.
The Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) was changed in 2011 so that waste derived biodiesel is eligible for twice the number of tradeable certificates than would be rewarded for biodiesel produced from non-wastes. One benefit of the change in approach is that the RTFO scheme also sets mandatory sustainability criteria which must be met in order for renewable fuels to benefit from any support. Thereby ensuing we reward fuels that deliver reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
The RTFO has been highly successful in supporting a market for waste derived biofuels. In 2019 over two-thirds (69%) of renewable fuels reported under the RTFO were made from wastes and around four fifths (79%) of biodiesel reported was made from used cooking oil, a waste.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what proportion of buses in regular operation are powered solely by renewable fuels.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The table below shows the percentage of buses used as Public Service Vehicles by fuel consumption type, by metropolitan area status and country in 2019/20.
Fuel Consumption Type | London | English metropolitan areas | English non-metropolitan areas | England | Scotland | Wales | Great Britain | England outside London |
Hydrogen | 0% | 1% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
Electric (not hybrid) | 4% | 1% | 1% | 2% | 1% | 0% | 1% | 1% |
Diesel-Hybrid | 40% | 5% | 1% | 14% | 6% | 0% | 12% | 3% |
Methane/Biomethane | 0% | 0% | 2% | 1% | 0% | 0% | 1% | 2% |
Diesel | 56% | 94% | 96% | 84% | 94% | 100% | 85% | 95% |
Other (including Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (HVO)) | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
Source: DfT Annual Bus Statistics (BUS0609b)
Asked by: Lord Spellar (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what his Department's policy is on the use of (a) food and (b) animal feed crops for the production of renewable diesel.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Government recognises that some crop derived biofuels can lead to an increase in greenhouse gas emissions due to indirect land use change factors, and concerns regarding the potential for increases in food prices as land and crops are diverted to fuel rather than food production.
Given these concerns the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO), a certificate trading scheme which promotes a market for sustainable renewable fuels, limits the contribution crop based biofuels can make towards a suppliers obligation (both bioethanol and biodiesel). This sliding cap on crop based biofuels decreases from 4% in 2020 to 2% in 2032. The RTFO provides additional support for low carbon fuels that do not compete with food and save significant greenhouse gas emissions compared to fossil fuels. Biofuels made from wastes and residues receive twice number of tradeable certificates than would be rewarded for the supply of biofuels made from crops.
Asked by: Alun Cairns (Conservative - Vale of Glamorgan)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made on the potential for synthetic fuel to drive motor vehicles to help meet the 2035 ban on diesel and petrol cars.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Government is consulting on ending the sale of new petrol, diesel and hybrid cars and vans from 2040 to 2035, or earlier if feasible. This is in line with advice from the independent Committee on Climate Change on what is required to achieve net zero emissions in 2050. Existing vehicles will be unaffected by this.
Renewable fuels, including renewable synthetic fuels, are incentivised through the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation and are an important measure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as we transition to zero emission vehicles.
Vehicles fuelled by renewable synthetic equivalents of petrol and diesel have the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions but are unlikely to offer the air quality benefits of battery electric or hydrogen fuelled vehicles.