Mass Imbalance - Why the voluntary certification of biomass fuels under the EU Renewable Energy Directive is failing to protect

DIRECTIVE (EU) 2018/2001 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 11 December 2018 on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources (recast) 7 EU, undated. [...] The following examples of failures are from the top to the bottom of the system. [...] of mechanisms to effectively monitor and sanction There are multiple reasons to doubt the effectiveness them if necessary; linked to this is the inadequacy of supervision of the audit certification bodies by the of the stated requirements for transparency, voluntary schemes. [...] are required to reveal about the operation of their There appears to be mostly minimal levels of routine systems, and what must be made publicly available monitoring of the certification bodies, and opaque about the outcomes of the audits and any problems processes in the cases of non-conformities. [...] The consequence is for these measures: considering the past evidence of that the schemes do not and most likely cannot ensure that abuse, the structural conflict of interests in the schemes bioenergy is produced without causing environmental and the opacity of woody biomass supply chains, the harms, such as deforestation and loss of biodiversity, or in incentive for woody biomass suppliers to chea.