UK Biofuel Policy: Envisaging Sustainable Biofuels, Shaping Institutions and Futures

Abstract

Abstract. Technoscientific innovation has played a central role in UK biofuel policy. When the government was proposing mandatory targets in 2007-08, public controversy over 'unsustainable biofuels' was channelled into prospects for future biofuels to avoid environmental harm and land-use conflicts. This vision serves as an imaginary-a feasible, desirable future. Societal benefits have been envisaged according to specific models of economic competitiveness, valuable knowledge, and environmental sustainabilitytogether comprising a prevalent imaginary of future 'sustainable biofuels'. This has informed institutional change along two lines. First, targets are envisaged as a temporary transition until future 'advanced biofuels' make liquid fuel more sustainable. Second, UK research institutes realign their priorities towards seeking investment from foreign counterparts and global energy companies, in the name of making UK science and industry more competitive. Together these measures have been justified as necessary for a transition to advanced biofuels which would better contribute to a low-carbon economy. Although this imaginary may eventually be transformed into reality, initially realised has been institutional change that reinforces infrastructural dependence on liquid fuel for the internal combustion engine. As an imaginary, then, 'sustainable biofuels' can help explain how a policy agenda promotes one future, while marginalising alternatives.

Knowledge in Climate Policy Integration: How non‐governmental organizations re‐frame the sciences of indirect land‐use changes for policy‐makers

“…() claim that CPI is often tied to technological innovation that enables economic and technological benefits without challenging the dominant framing. The Commission has acted accordingly by ensuring that advanced, next‐generation biofuels can mitigate the problems caused by crop‐based biofuels (also Levidow and Papaioannou, ).…”

The problem of epistemic jurisdiction in global governance: The case of sustainability standards for biofuels

“…On a similar theme of scientification, Palmer (2012) examined how the contingency of knowledge production operated in the modeling of indirect land use change (ILUC). Levidow and Papaioannou (2014) show how visions of biofuel futures were important discursive resources used by biofuel proponents to gain political leverage in the UK (for a similar argument in the US, see Mondou et al, 2014).…”

Sociotechnical imaginaries of low-carbon waste-energy futures: UK techno-market fixes displacing public accountability

“…Such accounting framed all such resources as ‘waste’, that is as a burden lacking other potential uses; this normative assumption underlay calculations justifying waste conversion to energy for lower GHG emissions. On this basis, the dominant imaginary promoted ‘institutional change that reinforces infrastructural dependence on liquid fuel for the internal combustion engine’ ( Levidow and Papaioannou, 2014 : 280). For these reasons, the UK’s statutory quota for biofuels became increasingly controversial.…”

“…According to industry stakeholders, biofuels as input-substitutes help to protect the investment value of the current transport-energy infrastructure, as well as consumer freedom through private motor vehicles. Thus the dominant imaginary reinforced incumbent energy companies and infrastructural dependence on liquid fuel for the internal combustion engine (Levidow and Papaioannou, 2014).…”

“…Techno-fix agendas likewise have an ambiguous relationship to policy change. They have helped justify some shifts in policy, while serving to avoid others (as with biofuels, Levidow and Papaioannou, 2014 , 2016 ; Raman et al, 2015 ). The latter role also can be seen in policy agendas for low-carbon technologies.…”