Beschreibung:
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>The expansion of biofuel production can lead to an array of negative environmental impacts. Therefore, the European Union (<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">EU</jats:styled-content>) has recently imposed sustainability criteria on biofuel production in the Renewable Energy Directive (<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">RED</jats:styled-content>). In this article, we analyse the effectiveness of the sustainability criteria for climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation. We first use a global agriculture and forestry model to investigate environmental effects of the <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">EU</jats:styled-content> member states National Renewable Energy Action Plans (<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">NREAPs</jats:styled-content>) without sustainability criteria. We conclude that these targets would drive losses of 2.2 Mha of highly biodiverse areas and generate 95 Mt <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">CO</jats:styled-content>
<jats:sub>2</jats:sub> eq of additional greenhouse gas (<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">GHG</jats:styled-content>) emissions. However, in a second step, we demonstrate that the <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">EU</jats:styled-content> biofuel demand could be satisfied ‘sustainably’ according to <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">RED</jats:styled-content> despite its negative environmental effects. This is because the majority of global crop production is produced ‘sustainably’ in the sense of <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">RED</jats:styled-content> and can provide more than 10 times the total European biofuel demand in 2020 if reallocated from sectors without sustainability criteria. This finding points to a potential policy failure of applying sustainability regulation to a single sector in a single region. To be effective this policy needs to be more complete in targeting a wider scope of agricultural commodities and more comprehensive in its membership of countries.</jats:p>