Biofuel use shows large climate benefit: study

Ethanol and biogas use in Sweden shows a large climate benefit, resulting in between 65 to 140 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than petrol and diesel, even when so-called direct and indirect soil effects are included, a new research study shows.

The study from Lund University's Faculty of Engineering punctures the controversial argument against biofuels made from food crops, such as ethanol from grain, or biodiesel from rapeseed.

"It is pretty irrelevant to rank various sustainable biofuels, there is room for all fuels, and all are needed to produce alternatives to fossil fuels. The challenge today is to increase the amount of sustainable biofuels in themselves," Pål Börjesson, researcher in environmental and energy systems at the engineering faculty, in a statement.

The Lund study for the first time looks at the scope of Swedish biofuel use and has analyzed its environmental impact, both in relation to each other and as alternatives to fossil fuels such as petrol and diesel.

While initially seen as a major boon for the fight to control climate change, many have come to believe that growing these crops serves no net climate benefit. Arguments such as that the biofuels use up more resources during food production, and force land reclamation for food in other countries instead, have been shown by the new study to be false.

"According to our results, there is nothing to suggest that biofuels produced from Swedish-grown crops under present circumstances would lead to indirect soil effects, such as, for example, land reclamation in South America or Asia," he said. The soil in developing countries is furthermore often assumed to be carbon-rich and thus a significant emitter of carbon dioxide, but the study shows no such link at current production levels.

"Despite this, several national economists insist that it may take 50 years for biofuels to repay their carbon footprint strictly due to the indirect soil impact." Biogas extracted from manure was considered the best alternative in tests which covered biogas, ethanol and biodiesel in different variants. Biogas performed 140 percent better than gasoline and diesel and had a net carbon benefit.

However, even the weakest-performing alternative still attained twice the EU standard that biofuels reduce greenhouse gases by at least 35 percent compared with fossil fuels. Each type of biofuel has different restrictions in production volumes, he added. In order to avoid adverse effects, it is important to know what those limits are.

"In the future, we could have adverse indirect effects on the land if we sharply increase biofuel production from food crops very quickly," said Börjesson. "There is a limit, but we are not there today."

Biogas from sugar beets, grass, maize, including residue in the form of household waste, industrial waste and manure, biodiesel from rapeseed, ethanol from wheat and sugar beets, as well as sugar cane ethanol from Brazil were studied. A co-production of biogas and ethanol from wheat was also analyzed. 

In addition to greenhouse gas emissions, environmental impacts such as eutrophication, acidification, tropospheric ozone and particle emissions were also included in the study, as well as emissions from the use of biofuels in light and heavy vehicles. Direct and indirect soil effects were studied. 

Currently, biofuels made from Swedish raw materials and sugar-cane ethanol imports account for about five percent of total fuel use in Sweden.

Volkswagen snaps up Italian car designer

Europe's biggest auto maker, Volkswagen, said Tuesday it would buy theItalian group that designed its first Golf model for an undisclosed amount. "Italdesign becomes a permanent member of the global Volkswagen family," chairman Martin Winterkorn said in a statement.

VW will buy 90.1 percent of the shares in Italdesign Giugiaro, while the Giugiaro family will hold on to the remainder. "The Volkswagen group will be continuing its model initiative over the coming years and will benefit from the capacity and competence of Italdesign," Winterkorn said.

"The company will therefore be making an important contribution to our 2018 global growth strategy," he said. The Italian firm was founded in 1968, posts annual sales of around €100 million ($123 million) and employs some 800 workers, the VW statement said.

VW has worked with the Italian design firm since the 1970s, when it helped develop the Golf 1 model, one of the German group's biggest successes.  Italdesign was founded by Giorgetto Giugiaro and Aldo Mantovani, and has worked with car makers worldwide, including Fiat, Renault, Ford, Toyota and theChina Automotive Company.

VW, meanwhile, has worked in the past year on a series of acquisitions, and already owns a broad range of car companies including Audi, Bentley,Lamborghini, Seat, Skoda, and the Swedish heavy truck group Scania. By the end of the year, VW is also expected to finalise a takeover of Porsche, and it has bought almost 20 percent of the Japanese brand Suzuki.

Shares in VW showed a loss of 3.59 percent to 65.71 euros in midday trading, while the DAX index of leading German stocks was off by 2.56 percent overall. Share in rival car makers BMW and Daimler posted losses similar to that of VW.

Wedding party turns into mass fight with restaurant staff

A wedding party in Bavaria turned into such a nasty fight that police are investigating for a possible attempted murder charge. 

The party on Sunday in the upper Bavaria town of Taufkirchen, ended with a mass fight in which six people were seriously hurt, two so badly that they ended up in hospital. 

The fight was only broken up when the initial police officers who showed up at the restaurant called for back up to help pull scrapping guests and staff off each other. 

The reason why the wedding party turned into a mass fight is not yet clear, but it appears that some of the 300 guests had an argument with some of the restaurant staff, which got completely out of hand. 

A group of around 30 guests apparently became physically involved in the fight. Five suspects were arrested. The bride and groom could not be found on Monday.

Swedish unemployment rises in April

Unemployment in Sweden climbed in April to 9.8 percent of the workforce with 483,000 registered job-seekers, exceeding expectations and up 80,000 on the corresponding month of 2009, a new report shows. The number aged 15-74-years-old and engaged in gainful employment amounted to 4,465,000 in April, showing no statistical change on last April.

In April 2009 unemployment amounted to 8.3 percent of the workforce with the April 2010 monthly change indicating that unemployment has not yet peaked, the report from Statistics Sweden (SCB) shows. "Unemployment, both in the number of unemployed and as a share of the workforce, is still increasing," SCB writes. 

For employment indicators the figures are however showing a slight positive trend, especially among men."Unemployment is climbing faster than expected. The employment forecast is broadly in line with what we had expected. This can indicate that the unemployment figure climbed as a result of temporary effects," said SEB analystOlle Holmgren.

Holmgren explained that the unexpectedly high unemployment figure could be as a result of the number of full time students who are looking for work over the summer. "It seems that a large part of the increase in unemployment is due to full-time students, who are looking for summer jobs. This can have a tendency to significantly impact the monthly figures, he added.

The strong stock market reaction in morning trading on Tuesday, with tumbling krona and interest rates, is explained by Olle Holmgren to have deeper lying causes and is not directly related to the unemployment figures. "The market has started to question the global recovery. The release of another figure which further supports this pushes the market down," he said.

The Social Democrat economic affairs spokesperson, Thomas Östros, has called the figures worrying, and argued that it indicates that the government's policies are not working. "It was a major and decisive mistake of the government to present a springbudget without any stimulating measures. This is a government which has abdicated its responsibility," said Östros, who predicted that this would be a key issue in the September general election.

Parties hold firm on euro despite Greek crisis

In the first of two articles on Sweden and the euro, Peter Vinthagen Simpson and Vivian Tse review party policy as Sweden's backing of a €750 million ($1 trillion) eurozone bailout brings the issue of Sweden's membership back into focus. 

Sweden's backing of the bailout of the eurozone economies has been defended by finance minister Anders Borg as underlining Sweden's interdependence with its EU partners. All the larger political parties came out in favour of Sweden’s membership of the euro in a 2003 referendum and a telephone survey by The Local indicates that political support remains strong for Sweden to eventually join the eurozone, although few are willing to commit to a concrete timeframe.

The Liberal Party (Folkpartiet) is the party which has perhaps gone furthest to establishing its credentials as a staunch advocate of Sweden joining the euro, and the ongoing eurozone debt crisis has done little to dent their resolve. ”We want to join the euro and we want to have a referendum in the coming years, within the next mandate period,” said Mathias Sundin, parliamentary candidate for the Liberal Party in Östergötland, to The Local.

Sundin emphasised that the party’s line has not been affected by the Greece crisis. ”The crisis in Greece is not because of the euro, it’s because of the way Greek politicians have ruined the Greek economy with short-sighted policies. Greece’s membership of the euro forces it to fix the economy, if they had their own currency they wouldn’t have to,” he said.

Despite the Greek problems, Sundin argued that the Liberal Party is in favour of supporting the bailout plan as ”the other option of a bankruptcy would be worse for Sweden, the EU, and the world”. The Social Democrats were in government when the 2003 referendum was held and led the chorus of parties and Swedish business leaders in favour of adopting the euro. While support in the party remains strong for Sweden to, a new referendum is not an immediate priority.

“We haven’t changed our minds because of Greece, but the situation reinforces the need to wait longer. It is too soon to have a referendum in the next four years. It is important to review the situation and look for a referendum in 2014,” said Sven-Erik Österberg, Social Democrat Party member of the parliamentary advisory council on foreign affairs, to The Local on Tuesday.

Österberg underlined the party's position that it is important for Sweden to join EU partners to pull together to help out. "If it's necessary, we should, because it's important for the whole situation in the EU to stabilize Greece. Otherwise it can spread to Ireland, Estonia, Spain, Portugal, and the UK, especially after the election, as we don't know what the new government will do yet."

Österberg argued that while there is unity in the centre-left coalition on their position with regards to the euro and a new referendum, the centre-right government is more split. Left Party spokesperson Britta Kellgren, however indicated to the Local on Tuesday that the centre-left coalition may not be as unified as the Social Democrats claim.

”We are against the euro and Sweden taking part in the euro. We believe the independence of the country and the economy would be destroyed; it is very risky and the developments of the last few weeks demonstrate that,” Kellgren told The Local.

Kellgren also rejected the idea of a new referendum on euro membership. ”There is no need for a referendum, we don’t want another referendum. We had a referendum in 2003 and the Left Party was against it then,” she said.

The Green Party removed the requirement to leave the EU from its party programme in the autumn of 2008 but remains opposed to Swedish membership of the euro and a second referendum. ”Sweden should keep out of the euro and not have a referendum. We are all too different and we should not have the same interest rates across the countries,” said Ulf Holm, the Green Party member parliamentary committee on European affairs, to The Local on Tuesday.

While Holm argued that it is too early to judge the fall out of the Greek debt crisis, he advised that the Green Party has become more sceptical towards the euro than before. ”I think it is necessary to help Greece out because the crisis can affect other countries outside of Europe and it’s necessary to stop that from happening,” he said.

On the issue of a second referendum, Holm stated that the centre-left coalition had agreed not to hold a referendum before the next election (in 2014). The Moderate Party is the largest of the centre-right coalition and while they are principally in favour of joining the single currency, during campaigning for the2009 EU election party leader Fredrik Reinfeldt appeared keen to deflect calls from coalition colleagues for a new referendum in the near future.

”We are in favour of Sweden adopting the euro, however we have also said that we should respect the outcome of the referendum in the meantime. But we want Sweden to adopt the euro eventually,” said Gustav Blix, Moderate Party deputy member of the parliamentary committee on European affairs, to The Local on Tuesday.

”We should have another referendum, adopting the euro would be a good thing for Sweden in the long run, but we need a well functioning monetary policy in Europe and a stable eurozone,” Blix said, adding that Sweden should be prepared to ”take our share of the responsibility” to help troubled EU economies, but should insist on ”high requirements” for reform.

The Christian Democrats amended their position during campaigning for the EU elections and in May 2009 joined their Liberal Party colleagues in calling for a new referendum sooner rather than later, in what many commentators dismissed as an attempt to attract the pro-EU vote.

"We would love to see Sweden in the euro. You can't change your position because of a one-off crisis," said Emma Henriksson, Christian Democrat member of parliament, to The Local on Tuesday, indicating that the party's 2009 shift was a longer term move.

Henriksson also argued that the crisis is not the direct fault of the euro and "would have been worse in many EU countries" without it, while underlining that the Greek bailout was mainly a question for Greece and the euro countries. "But if we are asked to support Greece, we should consider it, regardless of whether we are in the euro. We are dependent on one another, so you need to be prepared to join in," she said.

The Centre Party aligned itself with the no camp in the 2003 election and despite several leading party members in October 2008 voicing a call for the adoption of the euro after a new referendum, the party's position remains the same. "No. Sweden is doing just fine with the krona. It is our position that we should stand outside the euro but we are prepared to support a further analysis of the situation," said Staffan Danielsson, Centre Party member of the parliamentary committee on EU affairs, to The Local on Wednesday.

Danielsson also stated that the main responsibility for helping troubled eurozone countries should lie with the euro countries themselves but emphasised that Sweden benefits from a stable situation in the EU. "Euro countries should take responsibility for their own predicament. If the situation would deteriorate then of course Sweden could be harmed but we are satisfied that the current measures will be sufficient to avert further problems."

The Centre Party sees no immediate need for a new referendum but is supportive of the government's policy that an evaluation of Sweden's position regarding euro membership could be conducted within the next mandate period. "It is always positive with a new analysis. We will have to see how the euro develops and the results of any evaluation before considering whether we need a new referendum," Danielsson said.

Sweden, like the UK and unlike Denmark, holds no formal opt-out from joining the euro and must join the single currency when a series of macroeconomic criteria are met - including national debt, interest rates and exchange rate stability. In practice Sweden holds the right to decide when, and if, to join the euro by simply avoiding to meet all the criteria.

'Traumschiff' cruise ship evacuated after fire

The famous cruise ship MS Deutschland, the setting for the long-running ZDF television soap opera Traumschiff, has been evacuated after it caught fire while docked in a Norwegian fjord. The fire started in the engine room and was presenting problems to fire crews with the thick smoke that developed, a local rescue spokesman said.

The 364 passengers – mostly Germans – and most of the 241 crew, as well as the two Norwegian pilots, were taken from the ship. The heat developed by the fire was so intense that fire crews were hosing the hull down from outside to try to limit damage to the structure of the ship, which is famous in Germany due to the ZDF TV series. 

Fire broke out at around 12:30 pm, while the ship was anchored in the small town of Eidfjord, deep in the picturesque Hardanger Fjord, nor far from Bergen on the Norwegian west coast. 

All those on board were evacuated without any reports of injury. It is not yet known what caused the fire, which at times threatened to spread through the 175-metre-long ship, and took four hours to extinguish. 

The tourists, who were due to set sail for Hamburg on Sunday evening, were taken to local hotels and are making their way home by bus to Oslo and then ferry Kiel, said a spokesman for Deilmann, the company which owns MS Deutschland. The ship will be taken to Bergen as soon as possible so that a damage evaluation can be undertaken.

Delays expected as Frankfurt Airport custodial workers strike

Delays are expected at the Frankfurt Airport on Friday during an early morning strike by more than 150 custodial workers, union IG BAU said. “Terminals and equipment remain uncleaned,” regional head of the union of custodial workers Hannes Rosenbaum said in a statement. “The supply of on-board provisions for the airplanes is also severely delayed, as service firm personnel often take on loading the machines in addition to cleaning.”

The strike began at 4:30 am and lasted until 8 am. IG BAU asked affected passengers for their understanding. “The custodial workers do a hard job every day behind the airport scenes – and this for a low wage,” Rosenbaum said. The union staged the strike to encourage employers to complete a wage contract.

“We want 8.7 percent higher wages. There should also be additional supplementary benefits for retirement,” Rosenbaum said, adding that what the “wall” between wages in the east and west of the country must also fall. Friday’s action in Frankfurt could preface nationwide strikes beginning October 16 pending a union vote.

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