From rise in B to fall in C? Global environmental impacts of biofuels

Piroli, Giuseppe; Rajcaniova, Miroslava; Ciaian, Pavel; Kancs, d'Artis

From rise in B to fall in C? Global environmental impacts of biofuels

Autores

Piroli, Giuseppe

Rajcaniova, Miroslava

Ciaian, Pavel

Kancs, d'Artis

Descripción

This is the first paper that econometrically estimates the impact of rising Bioenergy production on global CO2 emissions. We apply a structural vector autoregression (SVAR) approach to time series from 1961 to 2009 with annual observation for the world biofuel production and global CO2 emissions. We find that in the medium- to long-run biofuels significantly reduce global CO2 emissions: the CO2 emission elasticities with respect to biofuels range between -0.57 and -0.80. In the short-run, however, biofuels may increase CO2 emissions temporarily (elasticity 0.57). Our findings complement those of life-cycle assessment and simulation models. However, by employing a more holistic approach and obtaining more robust estimates of environmental impact of biofuels, our results are particularly valuable for policy makers.