WBA Bioenergy Forum 12 Jun 2009, Beijing, China

Opening speech, Kent Nystrom

Ladies and gentlemen!

Bioenergy is the oldest energy recourse in the service of mankind. It’s dated back to when you tamed the fire.
The World Bioenergy Association is not that old. As a matter of fact it is only 1 year old. But the importance and benefit from global collecting of knowledge and experience of bioenergy from different parts of the world could be very large. It’s up to all of us if it will be the success it deserves. 
Bioenergy has a great potential to take an increased part of the energy demand globally. Thus contributing to combat climate change.
The total production of biomass in the natural systems is very large, roughly 10 times the total world use of energy for human society. So it seems to be no problem to take a considerable part of the energy demand.
But of course we are eager to cooperate with the other renewable sources to get an optimal balance. And how do they look upon us?
When the World Bioenergy Association (WBA) recently joined the International Renewable Alliance (REN Alliance) we got in the press release comments from the other members and from the Hon. Peter Rae AO, Chairman of the REN Alliance, who officially announced the joining of WBA on June 4, 2009. He said that:
“We warmly welcome the newly formed World Bioenergy Association to the Alliance. Bioenergy is used in almost every country around the world, and the potential to increase the use of bioenergy is very large. A wide range of technical solutions is at hand, both in developed and developing countries. Bioenergy can be based on a wide variety of biomass raw materials and biofuels (solid, gaseous and liquid), in small, medium and large-scale applications.
Richard Taylor, Executive Director of the International Hydropower Association (IHA) said:
“We welcome the timely joining of the WBA to the REN Alliance. Bioenergy, in the form of traditional biomass already accounts for the largest share of any renewable of the world’s final energy consumption (13%). Moving from traditional to modern clean sustainable bioenergy deployment is both a major challenge and opportunity.
Christine Hornstein, Executive Director of the International Solar Energy Society (ISES) said:
“ISES shares this strong enthusiasm and support of the WBA joining the REN Alliance. With the membership of the WBA, the REN Alliance can strengthen further cooperation within the renewable energy sector. Solar and bioenergy in particular, as decentralized renewable energy sources can play a significant role in providing sustainable energy especially in the developing countries.
Stefan Gsänger, Secretary General of the World Wind Energy Association (WWEA) said:
”Bioenergy is perfectly complementary to the other renewable technologies and has to play a key role in a worldwide sustainable and renewable energy supply system. We are therefore very pleased that the World Bioenergy Association has joined our International Renewable Energy Alliance and that now the leading global bodies of all the renewable technologies are working closely together.
Arni Ragnasson, Executive Director of the International Geothermal Association (IGA) said:
“It is a great pleasure for the International Geothermal Association to welcome the World Bioenergy Association into the renewable energy family Bioenergy will play an important role in harnessing the great potential of renewable energy for contributing to the solution of today's energy security and environmental challenges.
And of course we were very pleased to become a full member to the REN Alliance. I was quoted at the press release saying:
“We are pleased to join the REN Alliance and look forward to working closely with other members of the alliance. In addition we consider this an opportunity to further strengthen the important role of bioenergy as part of a worldwide renewable energy system. When we act together in the REN Alliance we can demonstrate the potential of renewable energy, correct false information and give a positive picture of renewable energy based on true facts.”

I quoted the press release, which was launched yesterday, because I think it’s interesting to show how the representatives for the other international renewable energy sources look upon the bioenergy sector.

And now to important messages for WBA to spread.
Sometimes you can hear that decreasing CO2 emissions is a too heavy economical sacrifice. But made in a proper way it could be profitable. As example we can show the development in Sweden since 1990. Simultaneously with a bioenergy increase of 80% there has been an economical growth of 40% (which is a normal level for Sweden during almost 20 years) and a reduction of the CO2 emissions with 10%.
Two month ago there was released a report called “Sustainable vehicle fuels – Do they exist?” The author is Pål Börjesson et al at Lund University in Sweden. The report is a contribution to the debate on indirect land use or displacement. Some voices who are critical to utilization of bioenergy has an opinion that using crops for energy purposes force an increased growing of crops for food and fodder on other land (displacement). And at the end you are cutting rain forests. Therefore you must charge biofuels, from grains for example, with a CO2 emission. This is what the discussion on “indirect land use” is dealing about. If all land suitable for growing is efficiently used and if there is no dynamic improvements it could be a fair way to reduce the utilization of biofuels. But the report shows that there are large amounts of land not used for growing or inefficiently used. Almost the same amount as the total used arable land today.  So the grounds for the displacement argument are wrong. Here we have an important mission to fulfil.
At the WBA board meeting in March we decided to start working on ten projects. 3 of them we have now merged into one. It’s dealing with “Bioenergy Certification Criteria, Quantifying and Sustainability Criteria & Bioenergy versus food, Land-use, and water supply”. The result of it will be taken as a WBA position paper and sent to the COP 15 meeting in Copenhagen as an offer from the WBA under a headline like "Global potential for sustainable bioenergy - World Bioenergy association's offer to COP15". Therefore I now think it’s time to count at WBA as an important player on the renewable field showing the great possibilities of the bioenergy to combat climate change. And now we welcome more bioenergy stakeholders to join us as members!

Thank you very much for your attention!