TITLE:
Addressing Sustainability Risks of Bioenergy—Policy Strategies and Corporate Initiatives
AUTHORS:
Michael Krug, Grażyna Rabczuk, Adam Cenian
KEYWORDS:
Biomass, Bioenergy, Sustainability, Policy, Business Strategies
JOURNAL NAME:
Energy and Power Engineering,
Vol.7 No.5,
May
20,
2015
ABSTRACT: This paper focuses on the sustainable use of solid and gaseous biomass for electricity, heating and
cooling. It provides updated findings of policy analyses and corporate strategy analyses performed
in the frame of BIOENERGY PROMOTION, one of the flagship projects under the EU Strategy for the
Baltic Sea Region. In particular, the paper highlights policies and measures which have been adopted
by the EU and EU Member States to address environmental and social sustainability risks of
bioenergy. Taking into account the conclusions of BIOENERGY PROMOTION, the paper identifies
promising policy developments, but also shortcomings. On the Member State level, the paper refers
to the examples of Germany and Poland. It illustrates how problematic policy priorities and
policy malfunctioning in two sub-sectors (biogas from energy crops in Germany, biomass co-firing
in Poland) led to undesirable environmental and social developments and how policies have been
re-adjusted to mitigate sustainability risks. The paper also portrays a number of voluntary corporate
sustainability initiatives which emerged due to the lack of a binding European sustainability
framework for solid and gaseous biomass. The authors conclude that without a binding sustainability
framework at EU level there is a risk of having a patchwork of potentially diverging sustainability
regimes and initiatives across Europe causing market intransparency and insecurity
for investors.