An immediate moratorium on plans to expand the use of biofuels is demanded today in a damning report from MPs that derides the alternative energy source for damaging the environment.

Biofuels often increase greenhouse gas emissions and exacerbate the climate change that they were supposed to avoid, a committee of MPs concluded.

The report accused the Government and the European Union of reckless support for biofuels that encouraged the destruction of forests and other carbon sinks. Its publication comes 48 hours before the EU is expected to announce in its Renewables Directive plans to increase the use of biofuels, with a target of 10 per cent of transport fuel to be supplied by renewable sources by 2020.

Ministers were accused of stimulating the industry too quickly and failing to introduce effective rules and monitoring to ensure sustainability.

Targets set by the Government and the EU to increase the quantity of biofuels used by cars and lorries should be dropped immediately, MPs on the Environmental Audit Committee said. They were critical of the forthcoming Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation to ensure that 5 per cent of road fuel sales comprise biofuels by 2010.

MPs recognised that second-generation biofuels could be useful in the fight against climate change, but said that it would be a decade before they could make an impact. The committee said in its report that it was a misconception that biofuels were carbon neutral, because there was a failure to take into account the greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted during their production, such as nitrous oxide from fertilisers, and transport.

“The final biofuel can lead to more GHG being emitted than if petrol or diesel was used,” MPs said. A prime concern was that forests were being cut down to make way for biofuel crops.

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