I'd heard the expression RT(F)M... but only heard of RTFO yeaterday. It's the "Renewable Transport Fuels Obligation"; new UK legislation under which petrol and diesel fuel must now contain a percentage of biofuel. It's set at 2.5% initially, rising to 5% in 2010.
It sounds like a good idea (to increase the proportion of fuel which comes from renewable sources, as opposed to fossil sources), but the measure seems to have attracted more criticism than praise. Mostly this centres around the question of whether it is enough to simply say that the biofuel must meet sustainability criteria. There are three main objections, as far as I can determine:
1 - some ways of producing biofuel are likely to generate more carbon dioxide than they save;
2 - some land diverted to biofuel production might otherwise have been devoted to food production;
3 - the legislation may introduce an incentive to destroy diverse habitat such as rainforest, so as to replace it with biofuel monocultures.
All of this seems to raise a question which is quite pressing given that the RTFO target is to double in two years' time: are the current 'sustainability' criteria specific enough to ensure that the target is met in a way which does not do more harm than good, and can they be effectively enforced? After all, who - in the UK - is going to be able to verify that a non-UK oil company is not paying farmers in a third country to grow biofuels on cleared rainforest... and then stop them from doing so?
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