This report considers the key questions surrounding biofuel production and use, including the "food vs fuel" debate, carbon emissions, sustainable production, deforestation and soil erosion, impact on water resources, human rights issues, poverty reduction potential, biofuel prices and energy efficiency.
What are the alternatives to sugar and grain-based biofuel crops?
Is the rail industry racing up the wrong track in its haste to boost its green credentials?
It isn’t just carbon-belching coal-fired power stations that are responsible for greenhouse gas emissions. With 27 per cent of total output, the electricity industry is undeniably the UK’s largest source of CO2 emissions, but at 25 per cent the transport industry comes a very close second.
At present biofuels are being heralded as one of the solutions to reducing the use of fossil fuels, but everything is not as rosy at it initially appears in the biofuels garden.
Fuels from biomass
(192 k) Updated July 2008
Michael Kenward cries into his beer over the biofuel boom.
Thinking on biofuels continues to change at an amazing pace.
As the USA finally acknowledges climate change, one of its "solutions" comes under growing criticism.
The arrival of the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation has highlighted the muddled thinking on biofuels.
Boeing, Rolls-Royce and Air New Zealand are teaming up to conduct a biofuel test flight, as part of a wider programme of research into viable and sustainable alternative fuels for commercial aviation.
Transport group Arriva is trialling B20 biodiesel - a blend of normal and plant-derived diesel - for the first time on its buses.
A major bus company has abandoned UK trials of biodiesel because of concerns over the sustainability of the fuel production process.
A Virgin Atlantic jumbo jet has flown from London to Amsterdam using a biofuel blend alongside conventional jet fuel.
Chemical engineers at Purdue University in Indiana are working on a process for producing liquid fuels from plant matter that, they believe, could provide all the fuel needed for "the entire US transportation sector."
A train running on biodiesel-blend has started running scheduled passenger services for the first time in Europe. The Virgin Voyager made its inaugural run today (Thursday) from London to north Wales carrying Virgin chief Sir Richard Branson and prime-minister-in-waiting Gordon Brown.
British biologists working on developing biodiesel alternatives to petrol have sealed a research agreement with their counterparts at a Chinese university.
An Oxfordshire biotechnology company has secured funding to develop a low-cost manufacturing process for 'next generation' biofuel.
Bus operator Stagecoach has launched a six-month environmental initiative that will let bus customers exchange used cooking oil for discounted travel. The Bio-bus scheme is expected to cut CO2 emissions by 82 per cent.