EC Joint Research Centre - JRC

Petten, Netherlands

The JRC is involved in many areas of research on bioenergy, and has pulled together its competencies in different scientific disciplines to address the issue of sustainability, in particular in-direct land-use change (ILUC).

The JRC is collecting information on the most important quantifiable parameters needed to formulate biofuels and bioenergy policy, such as sustainability studies, including Life Cycle Analyses, information on energy balance, greenhouse-gas-balance and environmental impacts. It also gathers techno-economic assessments of first and second generation biofuels, information on production and mobilisation costs, competitive use and impact on existing industries. In addition, the JRC amasses data on the effects on commodity/food/by-product prices and it makes overall cost-benefit analyses.

It furthermore analyses the water footprint for bioenergy production.

In cooperation with a wide range of partners, the Biofuels / Bioenergy Project is thus contributing to activities related to:

• Agro-environmental assessment of direct and indirect impact of biofuels policies.
• Scientific networking in the field of bioenergy at JRC (Biofuels Task Force) and at international level (International Energy Agency, European Environment Agency, OECD…).