Second generation bioenergy crops could deliver Brexit benefits

As the UK exits the European Union there is an opportunity for the country to restructure farming support to increase soil carbon sequestration and farm-scale biodiversity, protect current employment levels and create new jobs – by planting new second generation crops for energy use. So says a new report by the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI).

The report: Opportunities for rural job creation in the UK energy crops sector uses analysis undertaken for the ETI by ADAS, the UK’s largest independent provider of agricultural and environmental consultancy.

It concludes that the present political environment provides the country with an opportunity to restructure farming support in a way that encourages the sustainable growth of the UK biomass sector, in turn by placing value on the environmental benefits that growing ‘second generation’ energy crops can make to the UK farming landscape.

The planting of second generation crops (Miscanthus, short rotation coppice Willow

and short rotation forestry) also presents an opportunity to create new jobs and support existing jobs in the UK farming and forestry sectors.

The ETI has been a long-term advocate of bioenergy as a hugely valuable source of low carbon renewable energy because it can be stored and used flexibly to produce heat, power, liquid and gaseous fuels. Today, first generation crops dominate the UK energy crops sector but ETI research over the last ten years has indicated that second generation crops can deliver much greater greenhouse gas emissions savings across a wide range of end uses.

The organisation believes that, with improvement to total land productivity and a reduction in food waste, the UK could convert a total of 1.4mn ha of UK land to bioenergy crops by the mid-2050s without impacting on the level of land used for UK- grown food consumption.