The ongoing Conference of the Parties 28 (COP28) in Dubai, the United Arab Emirate (UAE), is again reminding the world on the role of biofuels in implementing the global energy transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources to save the world from the worsening impacts of climate change. Palm oil, palm wastes and palm biomass are the main feedstocks to produce the biofuels, which consist of biodiesel, bioethanol, bioavtur and biomass.
Based on the annual World Energy Transitions Outlook 2023 published by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the energy transition is aligned with the target of global net-zero by 2060, along with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C temperature pathway. It quoted climate scientists as saying that warming beyond the point will lead into a catastrophic and unliveable future for billions of people across the globe.
As one of the signatories of the Paris Agreement and regular participant in the COP, Indonesia has set its own nationally determined contributions (NDC) to cut greenhouse gas emission by 32% or 358 million tons of CO2e on its own and 41% or 446 million tons of CO2e with international assistance in 2030. To realize the target, the Indonesian government has designed an energy transition program to gradually replace the highly pollutive fossil fuels with the ecofriendly renewable energy sources, which include oil palm-based biofuels.
The ministry of energy and mineral resources’ (MEMR) New and Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Director General Yudo Dwinanda Priaadi said that the biodiesel, which is a mixture of diesel fuel and palm oil, has played an important role in the national program of decarbonizing Indonesian economy toward zero emissions in 2060.
According to him, Indonesia has been implementing the biodiesel mandatory program since more than 17 years ago. “During that period, we’ve gradually upgraded our biodiesel mandatory program from the initial 10% (B10) to 20%, 30% and to 35% (B35) since February 2023. The B35 program allows the mixture of 65% diesel fuel and 35% fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) processed from palm oil. The government has planned to further upgrade the biodiesel program to B40 and even higher until then reaching the maximum at B100,” he said.
Yudo said that in 2022 through the biodiesel 30 percent (B30) program Indonesia managed to cut greenhouse gas emission up to 27.8 million tons of CO2e with a total allocation of biodiesel quota at 11 million kiloliters worth more than US$10 billion.
“For this year (2023), quota of biodiesel is set at 13.15 million kiloliters, which are projected to reach a total value of more than US$11.2 billion,” said Yudo.
More than 90% of the biodiesel production is locally consumed, while the rest is exported. During 2012 – 2022, the biodiesel is mainly or around 40% exported to European Union (EU) market, and the rest to China (29%), the USA (11%), Malaysia (9%), and Singapore (6%).
The Palm Oil Strategic Policy Institute (PASPI) said that Indonesia is now the world’s largest producer of biofuel. As of 2022, there have been 32 biodiesel producers in Sumatera, Java, Kalimantan and Sulawesi, with a total installed production capacity at 17.14 million kiloliters, and total investments of US$1.78 billion.
Besides the biodiesel, Indonesia has also pursued the decarbonizing efforts in power generation, especially its coal-fired power plants.
State-owned electricity company PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara’s (PLN) has gradually replaced the use of coal in coal-fired power plants with palm biomass under its co-firing program. “PLN targets the co-firing implementation at 52 locations by 2025 by using the palm biomass. So far, it has been implemented at 31 locations by utilising 175 thousand tons of palm biomass. This realisation produces 185 GWh of clean electricity and reduces 184 thousand tons of CO2,” PLN President Director Darmawan Prasodjo said recently.
According to him, PLN has even successfully conducted a trial using 100% biomass of palm kernel shells as replacement of coal in Tembilahan coal-fired power plant (PLTU) with a generation capacity of 2X7 MW, in Indragiri Hilir Regency of Riau Province.
In addition to that, Yudo said that Indonesia is also ready for commercial production of bioethanol, biogasoline, and bioavture, which are all based on palm oil, and bio-asphalt (mixture of glycerine pitch (GP), a waste of biodiesel, and petroleum-based asphalt). All of them have undertaken all of the necessary tests before proceeding into the commercial production.
Globally, the biofuels have been growingly demanded as part of the energy transition to wean the global economy from the highly pollutive fossil fuels. The global aviation industry has adopted the bioavture as sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) to cut carbon emissions and realize its target of net zero emissions in the aviation industry by 2050.
Currently, the SAF makes up only around 0.1% of the fuel used in aviation, but many airlines have a target of 10% by 2030, while the industry’s net zero emission target by 2050 relies on SAF accounting for 65% of fuel.
Participants of the Global Biofuel Alliance during the recent meeting of G20 in India admitted the critical role of sustainable biofuels in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Supporting the Alliance, the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that global production of sustainable biofuels will need to triple by 2030 to put the world’s energy system on track towards net zero emissions by 2050.
Analysts have stated that the growing demand of biofuels will increase demand for vegetable oils as feedstocks. This might trigger a concern among green NGOs and other environmental activists that it will lead to the expansion of plantation areas of vegetable oils and worsen deforestation and environment across the globe. But perhaps it will highly depend on choices of vegetable oils to be taken as the feedstocks.
One of the vegetable oils is palm oil which is considered by analysts as wonder crop due to its high efficiency, productivity, and versatility. As a market leader of the global vegetable oils market, it commands more than 36% market share.
The Indonesian Palm Oil Association (GAPKI) Chairman Eddy Martono said that palm oil outcompetes its other rival vegetable oils, mainly soybean, sunflower, rapeseed, in terms of efficiency, productivity and versatility. “The global growers of oil palm plantations use only 9% of the total 322 million hectares of land areas used to produce the global vegetable oils, but they can produce 36% of the global vegetable oils,” he said recently.
The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has also admitted the palm oil as the most efficient in terms of land use compared to other vegetable oils. To obtain the same amount of production, other rival vegetable oils will require between four and 10 times more land areas.
It is because palm oil yields between 4 – 10 times more oil per hectare per year if compared to other vegetable oils. It means that if sustainably cultivated, the palm oil is the best choice among all vegetable oils in the case of fulfilling the growing demand of biofuel for the global energy transition with the least impact to the forest and environmemt. Benget Besalicto ST