Global Biofuels Alliance likely to be launched at G20: Sources

India’s proposal for setting up a Global Biofuels Alliance is likely to get through at the G20 summit with sources indicating that the new grouping may be launched on Saturday to help accelerate energy transition.

A group photo of the G20 world leaders may take place on the first day of the summit on Saturday after it begins at Bharat Mandapam, the venue for the two-day summit, sources said. The Global Biofuels Alliance, which the world’s third biggest oil consumer wants to push during its G20 presidency, mirrors the International Solar Alliance (ISA) piloted by New Delhi and Paris in 2015 to bring clean and affordable solar energy within the reach of all.

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Earlier this month, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told PTI in an exclusive interview that India’s proposal for a global alliance on biofuels among members of the Group of 20 major economies will help accelerate sustainable biofuels deployment in support of the global energy transition. “Such alliances are aimed at creating options for developing countries to advance their energy transitions,” he had said. “Biofuels are also important from the perspective of a circular economy. Markets, trade, technology, and policy all aspects of international cooperation are crucial in creating such opportunities,” Modi had said.

Biofuel is a renewable source of energy which is derived from biomass. India, which imports over 85 per cent of its crude oil needs, is gradually building capacity to produce fuel from items including crop stubble, plant waste and municipal solid waste. While India is on schedule to double the mixing of ethanol extracted from sugarcane and agriculture waste to 20 per cent with petrol by 2025, dozens of compressed biogas (CBG) plants are being set up. The Global Biofuels Alliance is aimed at facilitating cooperation and intensifying the use of sustainable biofuels, including in the transportation sector. Its focus is primarily on strengthening markets, facilitating global biofuel trade, developing concrete policy lesson-sharing and providing technical support for national biofuel programmes worldwide.

Such an initiative is also aimed at helping India’s transition to alternative fuels and cutting its import bill, as it seeks to achieve its net zero carbon emissions goal by 2070. On the other hand, the ISA aims to mobilise more than USD 1,000 billion of investment needed by 2030 for the massive deployment of solar energy. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that global sustainable biofuel production would need to triple by 2030 to put the world’s energy system on track towards net zero emissions by 2050. Liquid biofuels provided more than 4 per cent of the total transport energy supply in 2022.