The global economic meltdown has stifled many industries and African biofuel exporters are getting some of the burn as well.
Hart Energy Consulting Global Biofuels Center (GBC) director for biofuels: Europe and Africa Maelle Soares Pinto told Engineering News, “We see a lot of overcapacity in the European Union (EU), the most likely market for biofuels exports from Africa.”
She said that several African countries benefit from special tariffs in the case of ethanol exports to the EU.
Hart’s GBC executive director, Tammy Klein, added that, as yet, there is still not a demand driver in the African marketplace. “However, we recognize the great potential for the continent to be a major producer of feedstocks and note the many projects that are under way in many of the countries to cultivate feedstocks like jatropha, palm, cassava and sugar cane specifically for biofuels production.”
The rest of the world, however, will see an explosion in biofuels production. Despite a number of key issues, such as land use and competition for feedstock supplies for traditional food and feed uses, global use of biofuels is expected to more than double from 2009 to 2015, according to a new analysis report, ‘Global Biofuels Outlook to 2015’, recently released by Hart.