Australia's biofuels potential larger than target

Australian Renewable Fuels Association Executive Director Bob Gordon said Australia could produce 700 million liters of ethanol and biodiesel annually, twice the federal government target of 350 million liters by 2010. Gordon said there are barriers to the biofuels market that stopped new entrants from taking advantage of the government’s biofuels subsidy: the lack of excise until 2011. “This subsidy is only available when evidence is presented of the actual sale of ethanol into the transport fuel market,” he said. Only a third of the government’s biofuels production target for oil companies was met last year, he added. (May 7, 2007)