World Biofuel day

• A webinar on the occasion of the World Biofuel day was organized by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, with the theme “Biofuels towards Atmanirbhar Bharat”. World Biofuel Day is observed every year on 10th August to create awareness about the importance of non-fossil fuels as an alternative to conventional fossil fuels and to highlight the various efforts made by the Government in the Biofuel sector. World Biofuel Day is being celebrated by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas since 2015.
• Biofuels program is also in synergy with the Government of India’s initiative of Atmanirbhar Bharat and accordingly, the theme for World Biofuel Day 2020 has been chosen. Given the Corona/ Covid-19 pandemic, the function was held through a webinar this year.
• This day also honors the research experiments by Sir Rudolf Diesel who ran an engine with peanut oil in the year 1893. His research experiment had predicted that vegetable oil is going to replace fossil fuels in the next century to fuel different mechanical engines.
• Biofuels have multiple benefits such as a reduction in import dependence, ensuring a cleaner environment, generating additional income for farmers and employment generation. Since, 2014, the Government of India has taken several initiatives to increase the blending of biofuels. The major initiatives include administrative price mechanism for ethanol, simplifying the procurement procedures by OMCs, amending the provisions of Industries (Development & Regulation) Act, 1951, Long term ethanol procurement policy, ethanol distillation capacity addition and enabling lignocellulosic route for ethanol procurement. Under the Ethanol Blending Program, OMCs have procured 113.09 Crore liters of Biodiesel from 01.12.19 to 03.08.20. Under the Biodiesel blending Program, OMCs have increased biodiesel procurement from 1.1 crore liters during 2015-16 to 10.6 crore liters during 2019-20.

Source: PIB