The Global Biofuels Alliance (GBA) launched at the sidelines of the G20 Summit is seen as a watershed moment in accelerating the energy transition journey of countries across the globe, as it seeks to promote the adoption of biofuels and expand bioenergy access in emerging economies.
Driven by USA, Brazil, and India, which cumulatively contribute nearly 85% of the world’s ethanol production, the GBA made its debut with 12 organisations, including the likes of the World Economic Forum, International Energy Forum, and the World Biogas Association among others, and 19 member countries.
Domestic impact of India’s participation in the GBA
Global alliances like GBA will help accelerate technological advancement and engineering and design adaptation within India for cost effective integration of biofuels in the country. However, the formulation of an efficient supply chain to transport the vast quantities of feedstock from the source to the processing facilities is going to be the backbone for all these efforts and will be pivotal for the success of these endeavours.
The formation of the GBA will also empower rural India through a complete metamorphosis of the prevailing traditional cropping structure in the country which has been dominated by food crops thus far. Now, opportunities will emerge to explore the cultivation of fuel crops which may not be limited exclusively to those that are rich in sugar content, all thanks to the new generation of biofuels which can be produced from lignocellulosic biomass as well.
Meanwhile, food crops that are cultivated will contribute to the biofuel model through the agricultural waste they generate between cropping cycles. All of these factors, coupled with the incentivisation of organic feedstock aggregation, will create additional revenue streams for farmers in the country.
Since biofuels utilise feedstock sources like agricultural residue and Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) that tend to be carbon neutral, it is expected that increased adoption of these energy sources will lead to significant reduction in India’s carbon footprint and facilitate more efficient management of the country’s organic waste.
Putting India on the world map for biofuels
Biofuel adoption efforts have been underway in India for a considerable amount of time now and have been bolstered by targeted government initiatives like the Sustainable Alternative Towards Affordable Transportation (SATAT) scheme and the ethanol blending of petrol that is being increased from 10% to 20% in a staggered manner across the country.
The GBA will complement these initiatives and catapult them onto the global scale. Technology companies will have an avenue to access international markets, while project developers and entities looking to invest into the decarbonisation of the energy sector will gain access through ample avenues to participate in this historic transition of the world’s energy basket. It would be fairly accurate to state that Indian businesses and alternate energy players have never had a greater opportunity than this one to expand beyond the country’s borders.
Indian companies will have ample openings to create innovative technological solutions for other member nations of the GBA by virtue of their investments in energy generation technologies and end use solutions. Our country’s engineering and project management firms can work towards developing new assets, and domestic logistics providers can up their game to take the supply chain beyond India’s geographical borders.
Way forward
As the combined efforts of the GBA begin to gain momentum, India will need to bring its supply chain for feedstock up to speed, which has been largely uncoordinated and unreliable till date. This bottleneck has created a paucity of consistent year-round availability of feedstock for biofuel production that is essential for successful adoption. Extensive rural collaborations can help alleviate this chokepoint, and simultaneously create additional revenue streams for farmers and agricultural cooperatives.
Digital solutions like those provided by technology companies can be employed to introduce a customer-centric approach to this otherwise unorganised sector, and usher in accountability, transparency, and healthy competition. A conducive environment must be also created in order to attract investments into growing the necessary infrastructure for the aggregation, storage, and subsequent processing of biomass into usable biofuel.
— The author, Suhas Baxi, is Co-Founder & CEO of BioFuelCircle. The views expressed are personal.
(Edited by : C H Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Nov 7, 2023 3:55 PM IST
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