Sustainable production of bioenergy

Schwäbisch Hall, Germany

No child labour, no clearing of rainforests and no pollution: The public utility Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH have teamed up to refine social and ecological standards for the production of vegetable oils, because there is as yet no internationally recognised certification system for bioenergy and vegetable oils. The partnership is part of an extensive GTZ project on the sustainable use of biomass under a contract from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall already uses vegetable oil in its block-type thermal power station for the environmentally friendly generation of electricity and heat for its customers. “But we only want to use vegetable oils that are produced using environmentally sound methods and do not lead to exploitation and poverty in developing countries,” Johannes van Bergen, managing director of the public utility, explained. In the medium term, the partnership will help establish an international certification system; this is to form a basis upon which developing countries can set up certification institutions with specially trained experts at national level.

Mr van Bergen said that his company had chosen GTZ as a partner because the organisation had already had plenty of experience with certification systems and with developing social and ecological standards for timber, coffee and cotton. The sustainability standards drawn up jointly by GTZ and Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall will be applied to producers of vegetable oils in Africa, Asia and Latin America to see whether they work in practice. Training measures are to help ensure that producers meet the requirements of the certification process and are subsequently able to have the oil they export certified as being produced using socially and environmentally sound practices. The partnership thus makes a contribution towards market-oriented development and also helps combat environmental degradation, exploitation and poverty.

“An international certification system for vegetable oils will benefit all those who want to ensure that they only use sustainably produced vegetable oil,” said Daniel May, bioenergy expert at GTZ. “We will be taking great care to ensure that our development projects do not cause any environmental damage or have any negative social impacts through the production of bioenergy. The environmental life cycle assessments must be clearly positive, crops must be grown in line with internationally recognised social standards, and there must be no negative effects on food production.” Cornelia Richter, Director General of GTZ’s Planning and Development Department, added that GTZ was mainstreaming the sustainability concept in its activities, otherwise it would not implement these kinds of projects.

About GTZ: As an international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations, the federally owned Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH supports the German Government in achieving its development-policy objectives. It provides viable, forward-looking solutions for political, economic, ecological and social development in a globalised world. Working under difficult conditions, GTZ promotes complex reforms and change processes. Its corporate objective is to improve people's living conditions on a sustainable basis.

About Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall: Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall GmbH is a public utility company that provides not only power, gas, water and district heating networks but also high-quality energy services. It already produces more than 60 percent of the total power required in Schwäbisch Hall using combined heat and power generation. Twenty-three percent of the total power is now generated using renewable energy sources.