Europe downstream oil in brief: biofuel demand to grow ahead of RED deadline

European biofuel demand has been on the rise over the last decade and is expected to continue to increase up until 2020. This is predominately driven by the EU's 2009 Renewable Energy Directive which calls for at least 10% of road transport fuels, by energy content, to come from renewable sources. However, we do not expect biofuels to represent 10% of transport fuels by energy content in 2020. This due to a number of factors including the double counting of advanced biofuels and the ability of each individual country to take its own approach to meet the targets. These include mandates by volume, energy content and carbon emissions. Going forward, we expect to see a preference for second generation biofuels as there has been much debate over the use of crops for biofuels. Beyond 2020, there is some uncertainty but if the second phase of the RED is formally approved then the target would be raised to 14% by 2030.