On Wednesday (16th January) the All Party Parliamentary Group for British Bioethanol secured a debate in the House of Commons and encouraged MPs to argue the case for the introduction of E10 into legislation.
An NFU briefing was circulated to MPs outlining the cross-sector importance of bioethanol to the UK agriculture industry as well as the environmental benefits – very topical at the moment with all the climate change and emissions talk going on.
Introduction of E10 petrol onto UK forecourts would increase demand for feed wheat for bioethanol production. In years of surplus, this provides a key premium market for feed wheat producers rather than being subjected to global commodity prices. At full capacity, operation of the UK bioethanol plants would require 2mt of feed wheat, with approximately half of this being returned to the livestock sector as high protein Dark Distillers Grains with Solubles (DDGS). This is currently the only UK source of such a high protein animal feed and would reduce reliance on imports, mostly in the form of GM soya bean meal which stood at around 1.8mt imported in 2017/18.
During the debate, the importance to UK agriculture was mentioned by several MPs as well as the potential of E10 to play a key part in reducing emissions offering environmental benefits. We will await any further movements on this subject and shall continue to fight for E10 due to the incredible potential it has to deliver for the farming industry.
Click here to read the briefing (members only - you will need to sign in).